


Mosaics

by undercovermoffat (orphan_account)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anorexia, Anxiety Attacks, Eating Disorders, F/F, Hand Jobs, Hanji is agender because that's important, M/M, More chapters more tags, Off-Screen Suicide Attempt, dont read this its so bad im ashamed of it, eren's in the dark on so much, eren's sad and so am i, levi has a huge hero complex, mikasa and eren need to get their shit together, the year is 2005, why is eren so ooc
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-18
Updated: 2014-07-14
Packaged: 2018-01-25 14:00:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 11
Words: 45,213
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1651151
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/undercovermoffat
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Eren doesn’t believe in a cure for what he has. Getting it under control, maybe, but it’ll always be there, hovering around the edges of his awareness, reminding him again and again that he’ll never look in the mirror and like what he sees."</p><p>Eren thinks he's just a broken mess whose worst enemy is a scale trying to make it in the outside world;  Levi makes him feel normal and that's all he ever wanted.</p><p>((DISCONTINUED))</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Ayo look at that, after 4 months of sobbing over ereri until I've flooded my entire condo I finally wrote a thing. Inspired by My Mad Fat Diary but only loosely and you literally dont even need to know what the show is about to read this. My first SNK fic ahhh be gentle.
> 
> ~*PLEASE HEED THE WARNINGS*~ because they are not to be taken lightly. If you or someone you know is struggling with an eating disorder, please [ visit here](http://www.nationaleatingdisorders.org/find-help-support). If anything I write you find horribly offensive please let me know and I will remedy the situation immediately. 
> 
> More chapters more tags///
> 
> Not checked over so if there's any glaring errors feel free to tell me
> 
> Hella thanks to [ Melissa ](http://knoxronald.co.vu/) and also Tory who keep me going in life

Eren doesn’t really know when it all went wrong.

He thinks maybe it started when he was a kid, watching from behind a cracked door as his mother pinched at her stomach with a sigh and said something about losing weight. He remembers her sighing slightly over magazines that featured pretty young people with waistlines thinner than Eren’s wrist and prominent cheekbones that made them look all mysterious and grown up. He remembers watching girls giggle over those same magazines and at the cleancut, Photoshop abs of models and boasting about sharp jawlines.

But maybe it didn’t have to do with any of that all. Maybe it had to do with his mom dying, here one day, gone the next, because of slick roadways and a doctor’s appointment Eren will always blame himself for. He didn’t eat much after that, didn’t sleep, didn’t do anything at all, and that’s when the slew of therapy really started; it hasn’t ended since, five years down the road, but that’s besides the point. He remembers looking in the mirror two years and a growth spurt later and thinking that he looked better with those same sharp jawlines and prominent cheekbones.

Or maybe he was just born fucked up.

~X~

“You’re going home today!” Armin smiles at him from across the table. He’s pulling at the bandages around his wrists and Eren reaches across the tabletop to still his hands. Armin doesn’t break eye contact, but he stops his tugging. “Are you excited?”

Eren makes a vague noise and stares at his hands on Armin’s. “I’m happy to see Mikasa again.”  
  
“Well, what about your dad?”Armin asks with wide-eyed innocence. Eren gets angry at the mention of his father, but he attempts to cool it down, knowing that it’s not Armin’s fault that he doesn’t know just how much Eren hates the guy. _Hates a strong word_ , Mikasa’s voice echoes through his head, but he really doesn’t care. Mikasa would hate him to, if he had thrown _her_ into a fucking mental ward and rarely stopped by to visit. Mikasa showed up every week, spouting some new bullshit about how ‘Dad has to work’ and ‘Eren, he did this because he loves you’. The latter came from just about everyone but Eren doesn’t believe it for a minute.

“Not really,” Eren sighs eventually, keeping the tension out of his voice as much as possible. “He’s not even picking me up, Mikasa is.”

Armin frowns heavily and pulls his hands out from beneath Eren’s. “That’s rude,” he says after a moment and there’s sympathy in his voice that makes Eren ache. “Here,” Armin reaches into the bag at his feet that he carries with him everywhere. As far as Eren knows, all that’s in there are books and half-finished sketches that Armin can’t ever seem to finish. He pulls one of those books out, an older copy with yellowed page and a grey felt cover and sets it on the table in front of Eren. “This is my favourite poetry book.”

“Oh, Armin -”

“No, look,” he opens the front cover and points to where he’s written on the first page in his loopy handwriting. It reads Eren’s name, and beneath that, the opening lines of a Walt Whitman poem;

_I celebrate myself, and sing myself;_   
_And what I assume you shall assume_   
_For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you._

“I want you to have it,” Armin insists pushing the book further towards Eren.  Eren wants to push it back, but he _knows_ that his friend will keep insisting and insisting, and in the end, if Eren still says no, he’d just slip the book in with the rest of his stuff and Eren wouldn’t have a choice in the matter.

“Thank -”

“No, don’t thank me. Just take it.” Armin sighs and rubs at his arms through the thin fabric of his cardigan. He’s wearing a frown that Eren doesn’t like seeing. “Be careful out there. It’s not as safe as in here.”

Eren doesn’t know what to say to that.  Armin’s right, in a sense: in here there’s nobody that laughs at the things that keep you awake at night, that keep everybody in here awake at night. Out there, though, Eren’s more likely to be left alone -- aside from Mikasa, who he knows will be on his case 24/7 -- and if there’s a silver lining to anything it’s that. In here, he can keep an eye on Armin, who wears those bandages around his wrists because he’s a hazard to himself; but out there, Eren doesn’t have to see a man in a white labcoat and rubber gloves prodding and poking at him and reminding him that he’s too thin and too ugly. It’s a selfish way to think, that last one but his therapist always says that he has to take care of himself before taking care of others.

He looks at Armin’s wrists again, at the white gauze pulled tight and held in place by medical tape, and then meets his gaze.

“Be careful in here,” he says back and Armin’s mouth thins before he nods in assent.

~X~

According to the paperwork that they won’t let Eren see, Mikasa, because she’s 18 and written down as an emergency contact and a whole bunch of other things, has every authority to sign that same paperwork and lead Eren out of the hellhole he’s spent the past four months in.

When Mikasa sees him there are tears in her eyes and she envelops him in a hug that’s too big around his frail body. She barely touches him, as if she’s afraid she’ll break him in two. Everyone’s like that around Eren.

“You look good,” she tells him and her voice betrays her. Eren doesn’t think he’ll ever look anywhere near good but he smiles at her anyway. He feels a little sick, and the weight of the breakfast the hospital made him eat this morning sits in his stomach like a tumour. He doesn’t think he’s at all ready to face the outside world, to meet up with those same people he used to call peers, looking sickly with too-prominent cheekbones and a sharp jawline that doesn’t look as good as it used to. Even with the zinc and the strict regulated diet that he knows MIkasa will keep a sharp eye on, he still feels as if he’ll end up going full circle. After all, his feelings about himself haven’t changed at all.

Once they’re crammed in Mikasa’s loud, roaring truck that earns her enough double glances from gross men, she puts in a CD, but turns it down low. It’s one of her alternative rock bands, and the low sounds of a guitar riff filter out of the speakers, mostly drowned out by the drone of the AC that only works half the time. It’s blowing cooler air than Eren ever remembers it doing. “Did you get that fixed?” he asks, and the question makes him think of all the things he might of missed the past four months.

“Yeah,” Mikasa nods as she pulls out of the parking lot. Eren looks back at the formidable, dull building that he’s been calling home, and he thinks maybe if he squints hard enough he can see Armin’s blonde hair framed in one of the windows. He waves anyway. “I have a friend who’s a mechanic,” she continues, pulling out onto the road. It’s mid-morning and the traffic is light, which Eren is grateful for. He’s always felt like everyone stares at him whenever they’re at a stoplight or traffic sign. It makes his skin crawl.

“Listen,” Mikasa begins after a few moments of silence. “Me and some of my friends, we’re going to be hanging out at this diner, it’s no big deal. It’s quiet and there’s hardly anyone there.” She drums her thumbs against the steering wheel as Eren watches her face. “I know it’s early and you need adjusting, but I’d like you to come.”

“Today?” Eren squeaks and there’s a sheer panic in his voice he didn’t even think to hide.

Mikasa’s eyes widen at the sound. “No, not today, tomorrow, and then maybe the next day. If you want, I just,” she chokes up a little, like she’s angry with herself for even bringing it up at all. “I know it’s really hard for you but I don’t want you to be by yourself and I already promised them.”

Eren wishes he were angry at Mikasa, but in all actuality, he’s just mad at himself. He shouldn't even dream of expecting Mikasa to give up her plans just because her little stepbrother is breaking out of a damn mental hospital so she can watch over him. He shouldn’t have ever been there in the first place, but that’s a whole nother point that Eren doesn’t feel like getting into. Mikasa has every right to keep her plans; she also has every right not to want to leave Eren alone. If he’s honest with himself, Eren’s scared of being left alone. His hand curls into a fist anyway. “Okay.”

She looks over at him for a split second. “Eren, it’s okay if -”

“No, you’re right,” Eren clears his throat and keeps his eyes fixed on the road ahead. “I haven’t seen anyone besides doctors and Armin for four months. It’d be good.”

 

He chants the last sentence to himself for the remainder of the ride home.

~X~

“Home” is little more than a one-story house with three bedrooms and a shared bathroom  
that was the bane of Eren’s existence Before the Hospital. It’s nice enough: when your dad’s a doctor you make just enough to be considered middle class, so finances weren’t ever a thing Eren stressed about. (This is the part where Mikasa would say that stressing about money isn’t Eren’s job in the first place.)

Eren’s room is at the back of the house, and it takes several deep breaths standing in the middle of the kitchen before he can head down the hallway towards it. Mikasa watches him go, but stays in the kitchen, probably to cook dinner; she has a paper in her hand as she opens the fridge and Eren grimaces at the thought of what’s written on it. Things That Eren Needs to Eat to Maintain Healthy or something equivalent.

His dad isn’t home. Of course.

When he finally musters the strength to go inside, he finds it relatively untouched; his bed is made and his closet door is open, revealing the floor length mirror attached to the door that Eren smashed ages ago. There’s still fragments stuck in the frame and Eren quickly shifts his gaze in case he accidentally catches sight of his reflection. All of his clothes are hung up in the closet, mostly just band shirts and blue-wash jeans that don’t fit him anymore.

There are various posters for bands Eren hasn’t heard in months tacked up all over the walls, along with pictures of what little family and friends he actually had. They’re painful to look at, and so instead, Eren crosses the room and sits on his bed. The bed’s in the hospital had thin mattresses and pillows and sheets and he gets cold all the time, so it was hell on Earth for him. If there’s anything he missed about this house, that feels empty more often than not and reminds Eren of Before the Hospital, it was his bed.

Mikasa knocks on his already open door a minute later, carrying a bowl of soup and thick slices of bread. Eren feels sick at the sight of them. “I brought you some food,” she says, and sets the plate down on his desk. “Do you need help unpacking?”

Eren casts a glance at the single backpack he brought home from the hospital, laying sideways on his floor. “No, not really.”

“Okay,” she nods, but lingers by his desk for a moment.

Eren sighs and stands up, “Are you going to watch me eat?”

“It’s what they said I should do,” she replies. “I would have anyway.”

Eren hates people watching him eat. The doctors and nurses always had to in the hospital; they’d even make him drink these disgusting shakes that supposedly packed on pounds. Eren always went for a run around the track with Armin trailing behind him afterwards, but Armin always made sure that he didn’t overexert himself and ended up dragging him back to the cafeteria for something to drink. He knows Mikasa is worried, and he knows Mikasa cares, but it doesn’t make him feel any better.

He almost says, “Bread is fattening,” as he sits at his desk and pokes at it but Mikasa’s reaction wouldn't be a good one and so he refrains.

“Do I have to eat all -”

“Yes,” Mikasa snaps and then exhales heavily. “Please, Eren, just eat this for me. I’m putting you on a schedule and I’m going to make sure you follow it, alright? I can’t - I won’t let you end up in that place again.” Her fist bangs against the wall with the last part and Eren jumps in his seat. He’s known since the beginning that Mikasa blames herself for letting Eren get as bad as he did. It’s one of the many reasons he hates himself. It was never her fault; it never would be. She’s been looking out for Eren for as long as he can remember, like any older sister would, he supposes, and she shouldered a lot of extra responsibility for him after his mom died. She’s admitted to him that at first she thought it was just the depression - she didnt each much either after Mom died - but then, while she was off coping with alcohol and Eren was counting calories and getting poked in the ribs by friends saying, “You’re looking thin!”, it got worse and worse.

Eren doesn’t think he’ll ever forgive himself for doing what he did to MIkasa.

“I’m eating,” he promises her, and even though he hates himself for eating (even though he’d hate himself for not eating), he finishes every bite.

~X~

Two days and nine solid meals later and Eren’s staring at his wardrobe. Mikasa comes in a few minutes after he takes everything off the hook and lays it all to tell him, “Dad gave me some money to take you shopping for new clothes.”

“When was Dad here?” Eren asks, picking up a t-shirt for a band he doesn’t remember ever listening to.

“Really early this morning,” MIkasa waves it off, like she always does, and there’s a bitter taste in the back of Eren’s mouth. “He has a seminar thing in the city.”

Eren doesn’t believe that for one minute.

“We can go now or after we meet up with my friends, it’s up to you,” Mikasa says the last part in a hurry and tugs at the red scarf around her neck. Eren gave her that years ago when she first moved in with them and she’s worn it nearly everyday since. “We don’t even have to see them today, we could tomorrow, or Friday, or -”

“Mikasa, I’m fine,” he cuts her off before she overthink it. “We can go whenever, let’s just meet up with your friends like you promised.”

“Are you sure?” she asks him, her eyes softening and Eren nods in return. In truth, he’d rather not go at all, but he knows Mikasa won’t let him stay by himself, and getting out and being social is good for him anyway. His therapist - who he has to go back to the hospital and see every Friday - has suggested several times that “increased social activity” will help his treatment. He thinks that Dr. Pyxis doesn’t understand how teenagers work at all.

“I’m sure,” he tells Mikasa with a smile that even feels fake.

In the end he’s wearing loose fitting jeans held up only by the tightest belt loop and that stupid band-tshirt, with two layers of jackets on. Eren gets cold all the time because of - well - and Mikasa offers him her scarf when she sees him shivering as they walk along the street towards the part of town that has all the local businesses lined up. The town is small and there’s not much to it besides said local businesses and a couple neighbourhoods. The high school actually brings the three nearest towns together to make up the student body.

The diner that Mikasa and Eren are meeting people at is relatively small, a hole-in-the-wall type place painted in bright colours with a freckled guy working behind the counter cleaning a glass. There’s a group of teenagers inside and Eren’s stomach clenches at the sight; before they enter through the glass door, Mikasa holds Eren’s shoulders and says, “Just take it one second at a time, alright? If it’s too much we can leave.”

“I’m _fine_ ,” Eren repeats for what feels like the thousandth time, and lifts Mikasa’s hands off his shoulders. It’s an obvious lie but he has to at least pretend to be alright, for his sister’s sake. “Really.”

Mikasa nods and leads him inside and right away, he’s suddenly self conscious at how loose his clothing is, at the two jacket’s he’s wearing in 80-degree weather in late May, at the circles he can’t get to go away from beneath his eyes. The inside smells like freshly baked dessert and Eren digs his nails into his hands whilst breathing through his nose.

An obnoxious voice calls, “Mikasa!” and some kid with an undercut and a face long like a horse’s stands up, greeting Eren’s sister like their best friends. There’s grease stains on his white shirt and Eren wonders if that was the mechanic friend Mikasa told him about. “It’s been too long.”

“It’s been three days, Jean,” Mikasa grinds out and falls into a seat next to a pretty blonde sipping at a milkshake. Eren sits in the empty chair beside her and looks at anything but the plastic-backed menu set out i front of him.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jean waves his hand and sits back down, linking his hands together behind his head and tilting his chair back. “So, is this Eren?”

Eren looks over at the sound of his name. “Uh, yeah. Hi.”

“Hi,” Jean smiles this crooked smile that makes Eren’s skin itch for unknown reasons. He’s chewing loudly on a piece of gum and Eren’s already annoyed. The other people at the table - the pretty blonde and the brunette girl next to her; another girl eating a cookie and a boy with a buzzcut - all stare at Eren and suddenly he feels like he’s suffocating.

Mikasa seems to catch on to Eren’s wide-eyed stare and cuts in, “Eren, this is Krista and Ymir,” she gestures to the two girls sitting next to her, and then across the table, “and Sasha and Connie. And Jean. Marco over there,” she points to the freckled boy behind the counter that’s now on the phone. “Works here, his parents own the place.”

“Hi, Eren!” Krista says and reaches across Mikasa to hold out her hand for Eren to shake. “It’s really nice to meet you, Mikasa’s said some really nice things about you.”

It occurs to Eren that Mikasa had to tell all of her friends about her troubled brother, the one who doesn’t eat and had to be hospitalised for doing something stupid to himself.He wonders if they all know and that suffocating feeling comes back, his face burning red hot. He grabs Krista’s hand; it’s incredibly warm compared to his, which are clammy and always cold. “Nice to meet you,” he stumbles in saying and pulls back almost right away.

 

Ymir doesn’t bother greeting him, just nods and puts an arm around Krista’s shoulder, while Sasha swallows her cookie and gives him a large smile. Connie ruffles Eren’s hair like they’re old friends, and it eases some of the tension in his chest. They aren’t looking at him as if he’s some weird guy, as if he’s broken or a freak. It feels nice.

“Mikasa said you’ve been vacationing in Florida?” Krista asks and just like that it all comes crashing down.

A wave of nausea rolls through Eren’s stomach. Of course they don’t know - MIkasa’s probably ashamed of him, why would she tell her friends about her fuck-up of a brother? Mikasa’s stare is drilling into the tabletop and Eren can’t even bear to look at her profile. God, he should've known better. “Yeah,” he says after a pause. “Near Orlando.”

Mikasa looks in the other direction. “Ooh!” Sasha perks up. “I heard that at Disneyworld they have this thing or something where you can try all the different foods from around the world.” She stares over Eren’s head dreamily. “I bet it’s all so good.”

“That’s in Epcot,” Connie corrects, elbowing Sasha to get her back down to Earth.

“Wherever it’s at, I bet it’s awesome,” Sasha seemingly salivates. “Did you go to that?”

Before Eren can get further into the elaborate lie that Mikasa herself set up, his sister stands and says. “Think I can get Marco to give us some free donuts?”

“No way,” Connie and Sasha say at the same time, overlapping each other, and Krista smiles into her milkshake.

“You couldn’t,” Jean says and stands up, looking over at the rest of the group and winking. “But I sure could.”

“Oooooh,” Connie rings out and Sasha, Krista and even Ymir all laugh as Jean saunters away from the table. Eren watches as he leans across the countertop to talk to Marco, giving a smile that looks more flirty than anything else; Marco blushes furiously and shakes his head, shrugging his shoulders as if to say, “There’s nothing I can do.”

“He’s not gonna do it,” Sasha says and she sounds genuinely disappointed.

“You could always stop being stingy and buy the donuts,” Ymir speaks up for the first time and she raises an eyebrow at Sasha. Krista rolls her her eyes and nudges her shoulder against Ymir’s hard.

Mikasa is still standing and Eren looks up at her face. She’s wearing that stoic, expressionless face she makes when she’s upset and to be honest, Eren’s not sorry for it at all. His chest still aches, but a part of him keeps whispering that maybe it’s better this way. Maybe it’s better that these normal kids don’t know how fucked up he is.

He’s reflecting on this when Jean comes sulking back to the table, flopping into his chair. “I got shot down, guys.”

Connie pats Jean’s shoulder. “We’re here for you, man.”

Just then, the door to the diner opens with a chime - Eren’s anxiety instantly skyrockets - and a group of loud teenagers comes through, wearing dark clothing and probably too much eyeliner. There’s about seven in total, and they’re rowdy and more obnoxious than even Jean. They look like those stereotypical punk kids, with leather jackets in July (not that Eren can say much), and piercings. One of the guys is wearing one of those thin tank tops with weird sayings on them, revealing the tattoos lining both of his arms. They’re intimidating to say the least, even the shortest of the bunch, a guy wearing a mask of apathy better than Mikasa’s.

“Oh Gooood,” Jean groans loudly. “I hate those guys.”

Everyone shoots Jean a look and Mikasa sits down abruptly, startling Eren. He thought their appearance was intimidating, but if Mikasa is even active in avoiding them they must be pretty bad. She still won’t meet Eren’s eyes, and so he doesn’t attempt to meet hers either.

“You got a problem, bud?” one of the guys says, the taller one with the tattoos.

“Let it go, Auruo,” the shortest one says in a voice that matches his blank expression, looking up at his friend with narrowed eyes. “We have better things to do.”

Something in Jean sparks at that. “You think you’re better than me?” He stands up, hands curled into fists.

The other guy sighs heavily and takes a step towards Jean, who has to look down at him. It’d be comical if Eren didn’t think that fists were going to be flying soon. “Listen, kid, I really don’t have time to be dealin’ with shitty brats like you -”

Jean doesn’t take well to that and his fist is flying before Eren can blink - however, the stranger dodges it and in one swift move is kneeing Jean between the legs and bringing him to his knees. Jean makes a vague oof sound and in the next second, there’s a fist connecting with his nose. Blood gushes almost immediately and Connie and Ymir rush over to help Jean to his feet.

Eren’s aware of Marco screaming in the background to “knock it off” and then, once he realises it’s Jean that’s been hurt, his name, before he’s hopping over the counter to come over and asses the damage. Jean shrugs everyone off of him and stands, as the other guy inspects his knuckles with a wrinkle to his nose.

“You got your blood on me,” he says and Jean shoots him a sharp glare.

“Jesus fuck,” Jean curses, as Marco presses napkins to his nose. “What is your problem, man.”

“I don’t appreciate being threatened.”

“Levi,” one of the guy’s - Levi, Eren assumes - companions says , putting a hand on his arm. “Let’s just get out of here we’ll come back when these losers aren’t around.”

 

Levi looks over at Jean and the group with disdain, and when his dark eyes land on Eren, Eren inhales sharply. He doesn’t say anything, and Eren’s expecting him to walk out, but instead he just sits down at the nearest table. His friends exchange a look with each other before sitting down too and Marco looks at them like he’s been personally offended.

 

“You’re gonna have to leave,” he sneers out, still pressing napkins to Jean’s face.

“Are you the manager?” a blonde guy sitting next to Levi asks.

“Well, no -”

“Then,” he smiles crookedly and picks up one of the menu’s. “We’ll stay.”

Marco opens his mouth to argue but Jean draws away from him and says, “Forget it, Marco, we’ll just go.” Sasha and Connie look ready to protest, but Ymir, who had kept an arm in front of Krista as if to protect her the entire time, turns on her heel at the words and heads towards the door, taking Krista with her by the hand. Mikasa looks at Eren for the first time, sighs, and follows suit.

Eventually, despite Marco’s protests, and promising to call his parents to get the other kids out, Eren and company leave the diner, but not before Eren meets Levi’s eyes one last time.

Maybe it was the trick of the light or maybe it was Eren’s anxiety, but he could’ve sworn Levi _winked._

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was gonna wait until Sunday to post chapter 2 but y'know yolo and all that. Guest starring the beautiful babes from A Choice With No Regrets which is 10/10 by the way, but in case you don't know who they are just know that in ~*canon*~ they're these huge cuties from Levi's past and Isabel canonly called Levi "big brother" and don't talk to me about ACWNR because I will cry.

Mikasa and Eren head straight home after the Jean-Levi fight, Mikasa giving everyone an excuse about needing to cool down or something. Krista smiles at them both and hugs them goodbye; she even squeezes Eren tight, and he has to fight down a smile that’s too big to be normal. He hasn’t been given a real hug in ages.

The walk back home is silent. Eren knows Mikasa is thinking about the Florida thing, because he is, too. He’s not angry as he was at first, and in a way he understands it. It doesn’t ease the hurt any less, though, and leaves him feeling bitter. He wishes he wasn’t like this, and he’d give anything to change it. He’s trying to, for Mikasa’s sake if not his own, with therapy and those strict diets and avoiding the media and mirrors. But he still feels _fat_ , he still feels like he takes up too much volume in this universe, even as people look at him and tell him he’s not taking up enough. In a way, he doesn’t think he deserves to occupy anymore.

Eren doesn’t know when these feelings will go away. He’s starting to think they never will.

When they get home, Mikasa takes ahold of Eren’s arm to make him sit at the kitchen table. He thinks she’s going to talk to him finally, but then he catches sight of the time and remembers his schedule.

“I’m not hungry,” he tries to tell Mikasa as she reaches for boxed macaroni in one of the cabinets.

“It doesn’t matter,” she replies, and her voice sounds wobbly. “You’re going to eat.”

Eren figures there’s no use arguing, and sheds one of his jackets with a sigh. There are unspoken words sitting on his tongue: he wants to ask MIkasa why she lied, but more than anything he wants to know if it’s because of the reasons he thinks. He can't seem to make himself though and swallows them down as she puts a pot of water on the stove.

“Your friends are nice,” he attempts after Mikasa spends several minutes staring at the water. “I meant to talk to them more, I just -” he breaks off and scratches the inside of his wrist. When he draws away, the skin is bright pink.  “Jean’s wild, though.”

This earns a half-hearted chuckle from MIkasa. “He’s always getting into fights. His temper’s probably worse than yours.” The wobble in her voice is steadier than before, but still present.

“Who were those kids?”

Mikasa sighs as she turns up the heat on the stove. “They aren’t really _kids_. The one that kicked Jean’s ass is like, nineteen, I think.” Eren raises an eyebrow. “I know, he looks twelve. They’re just a bunch of punks - literally. I’m pretty they even call themselves punk.”

Eren stifles a laugh.

“They don’t really do anything besides vandalize and smoke and piss Jean off. But I mean, they’re really good at beating up people who get on their bad side. I think there was this one guy who stole from Levi - their leader, or whatever - and he came to school three days later with a broken arm and two black eyes. I wouldn’t fuck with them,” the water is finally boiling as she says this, and she rips open the macaroni box and dumps the noodles in. Eren doesn’t miss the way she tears up the package before throwing it away, so that the Nutrition Facts are unreadable.

“They sound hardcore,” Eren says and smiles when Mikasa looks over at him.

She returns the smile but there’s an apology in her eyes; Eren knows what the Florida thing will come back to bite them in the ass later, but for now it’s out of the way. Eren still hurts on the inside, and it’ll probably keep him awake tonight, but he’s content with avoiding a fight for as long as he can. It’s not smart, but it’s what they’re going to do.

They eat in relative silence, and even though it’s only seven o’clock by the time they’re done, and the sun is just setting, MIkasa turns in for the night. Eren spends twenty minutes wandering around the house, avoiding the bathroom and his bedroom, making sure the doors are locked and nothing’s ready to catch fire.

When he can’t occupy himself anymore, he decides to brave the bathroom so that he can shower away the stress from the day. Just stepping inside makes him uneasy and he spends a minute sitting on the edge of the bathtub just to breathe. He thinks of the dinner he ate, of the days Before the Hospital when he’d come in here feeling guilty for eating and just stick his toothbrush down his throat and -

He stops the thought process as quickly as he can, standing up to crank on the shower. Eren tries to convince himself that he’ll feel better after a warm shower, that he won’t revert back to his old ways, that the therapy is paying off. He just has to make it to his appointment in a few days and he’ll be fine, he’ll talk it over with Pyxis and those old urges will be gone.

He hopes.

Eren hates showering because it means being open and vulnerable, naked under the water where he can look down at himself and see the consequences of his illness, see the scars on his thighs from when he did something stupid. For a few weeks, every time he’d shower at the hospital, he’d go back to his room crying loud enough he was always surprised he didn’t wake up the entire floor. Sometimes, Armin, who had shared a room with him, would crawl into bed with Eren and soothe him as best as he could. It didn’t always work, but Eren was always grateful for the attempt and  the attention.

Eren manages to make it through his shower whilst keeping his eyes firmly shut, and he crawls into his bed, knowing it’ll be a long while before he can fall asleep.

~X~

Mikasa wakes him up from a nightmare about screeching metal and his mother’s voice, promptly at nine o’clock, to feed him a breakfast of oatmeal and fruit. He hates the way it tastes in his mouth but he eats it anyway, like he’s eaten everything she’s been giving him, as she sits across from him and watches.

“Dad’s gonna be home tonight,” she tells him and Eren almost drops the glass he’s holding.

“I thought he had a seminar thing,” he snaps back, standing quickly to take his dishes to the sink. “What happened to that?”

“It only lasted a day,” Mikasa stands too, but doesn’t follow him. “I was thinking I’d take you shopping before he got home.”

“Why.” Eren scrubs furiously at his bowl.

“Just,” she swallows. “Something to do. It was just a suggestion, Eren.”

“I don’t feel like it,” he responds, turning  the faucet off. “I just wanna stay home today.”

 

“Eren -”

“Seriously, Mikasa,” he turns around to face her, “I went out yesterday with you, I’ve been following your diet and schedule, I just want a day to myself.”

 

She looks at him for a moment, crosses her arms, and says, “You know I can’t leave you by yourself.”

“Of course not.” There’s fresh anger bubbling in his stomach and today, he’s not so sure he’s going to be able to fight it. The words come out before he can think to stop them, “Can’t leave your fuck-up brother alone even in a single room, huh.”

Mikasa is furious instantly, and honestly, Eren expected nothing less. “You’re not a fuck-up, Eren -”

“Of course I am!” he yells back, and now he knows there’s no going back. “I’ve been in a fucking mental hospital for four months, I’m the _definition_ of fucked up. I’m so much of a fuck up that you couldn’t even tell your friends that, you had to say I was in _Florida. Florida_ , Mikasa, really. It’s not even that believable, why would I even be there!”

“I didn’t tell anyone because I didn’t want it to be my decision,” Mikasa snaps back, but there’s a cool, evenness to her tone that only she could pull off in in the heat of an argument. “I don’t have the right to tell people, anyway, it’s your business -”

“Bullshit,” Eren spats and even dares to take a step closer. There are tears in his eyes and he hates himself for that. “Just admit it, you’re embarrassed.”

Mikasa stares at him for a long moment, and all she says is, “How dare you.”

“You can’t even deny it.”

 

“Eren -”

But he’s not listening at this point, and the tears are flowing faster than ever before. He picks up the jacket he left behind the night before and heads for the front door, ignoring Mikasa’s feeble attempt to grab his arm. There’s hesitation in her touch, and it’s enough for Eren to get away.

“Where are you going?” Mikasa follows Eren as he opens the front door, ready to slam it behind him.

“I’m just going to the diner, call Marco if you don’t believe me.”

And then he’s slamming the door in his sister’s face.

~X~

Eren didn’t have intentions of going to the diner at all, at first, but realising he had nowhere else to go to cool off, ended up there anyway. He realised during the trip that he had no right to get mad at Mikasa, and that he was just taking out his self-hatred on her, which is ten kinds of unfair, and - well. Fucked up. It doesn’t make his hands shake any less and it just increases the self-loathing tenfold

He curses himself under his breath as he walks up the sidewalk towards the diner. He thinks maybe he’ll just sit inside for a minute, in case Marco is there and can confirm his presence so that Mikasa won’t worry. Eren ignores his reflection in the glass storefronts as he walks, and before he can get to the diner, he sees a figure leaning against the wall in his path.

Upon closer inspection he realises it’s that punk, Levi, from the day before. Levi’s lounging against the wall in front of the arcade next to Marco’s parent’s diner, smoking a cigarette in long drags and staring at the road. The awning over the storefront blocks out the sun overhead and throw’s his face into oddly angled shadows. Eren slows when he nears him, and he panics, thinking he’ll just turn around and head back home, when Levi looks over at him.

“Yo,” he says and Eren stares blankly at him.

“You’re that kid from yesterday,” Levi continues, flicking the burning cherry off his cigarette onto the asphalt. “Is your friend okay? I didn’t mean to hit him so hard he just pissed me off.”

Eren continues to stare and then gets out in a stutter, “I, uh - we’re not really friends.”

Levi smiles crookedly at him. “That’s good. I can’t stand that brat.”

Eren feels bad for not defending Jean, but he doesn’t know him well enough, and in all honesty, he’s not sure he wants to. Levi studies him in the silence, and in the dark of the shadows, his eyes look almost black. Eren’s feeling self conscious and averts his gaze, tugging at the edges of his jacket until the sleeves cover his hands.

“Aren’t you hot in that?” Levi asks between puffs of his cigarette. Eren wrinkles his nose at the smell; for some reason, it reminds him of his father.

“I get cold easily,” Eren confesses and Levi nods like he understands.

Eren opens his mouth to return the question - after all, Levi’s wearing all black again, with that same leather jacket that somehow doesn’t hang loosely off his small frame - but the door to the arcade opens and two of Levi’s friends stumble out. One of them is the blonde guy that refused to leave when Marco asked him to, the other a girl with her hair dyed bright pink and drawn into pigtails. They’re laughing about a joke that Eren didn’t hear and Eren has to step back to avoid them.

“Sorry,” the girl apologises when she realises she’s almost bumped into Eren. “Oh, hey you were there yesterday.”

“Don’t worry, Isabel, he’s cool,” Levi says, dropping his cigarette to the ground and stepping on it with the heel of his boot.

Isabel’s expression softens when she looks back at Eren. “What’s your name?”

“Eren.”

“Ooh, what a pretty name,” she smiles really big with blinding white teeth. “Well, if big brother says you’re cool then you must be.” She punches his arm in a friendly manner and he winces. “Ohh,” she coos. “You’re so scrawny, I just want to bake you a cake-”

“Isabel,” the blonde stranger rolls his eyes.

“ _Farlan_ ,” she replies, putting a stress on his name. “Come on, look at him, he’s tinier than brother -”

“Okay,” Levi cuts in and Isabel and Farlan look at him right away. “Let’s go back inside it’s hot out here.” He doesn’t give them a chance to reply before he’s disappearing back into the arcade; when he opens the door, there’s a blast of cool air that makes Eren shiver and the _ching!_ ing of arcade games. Farlan nods at Eren, and Isabel squeezes his shoulder before they follow Levi inside.

Eren stares after them for a moment, thinking about Levi referred to him as “cool” and trying not to think about Isabel’s comments on his appearance. They don’t seem so intimidating, now that he’s talked to them, he thinks as he keeps walking towards Marco’s diner.

When he gets inside, Marco is in fact there, sweeping the floor. There’s a women standing behind the counter with Marco’s eyes and freckles; Eren assumes it’s his mother. Marco looks up at the sound of the door opening and smiles when he sees Eren. “Hey!” he greets with genuine warmth. Eren thinks he’s wearing the most sincere smile he’s ever seen.

“Hi,” Eren says, finding the nearest seat. “Is it okay if I stay here for a few minutes?”

Marco nods, “Of course, of course.” He sets the broom aside and takes the seat across from Eren, folding his hands on the tabletop. When he speaks, his voice is soft. “Mikasa texted me. Are you feeling alright?”

Eren’s not sure he wants to talk about it but there’s such concern in Marco’s gaze that he feels compelled to. “Yeah, I’m just - adjusting to being home, is all.” It’s the closest he can get to the truth, he thinks.

Marco nods, but then hesitates. He opens his mouth a few times before he finds the courage to say, “Eren, I - I just want you to know that if there’s anything you need, ever, just let me know okay?”

_He knows_ , Eren realises. He doesn’t know if Mikasa told him, or if Marco can just read it on him. Maybe he knew somebody with the same problem and is familiar with the signs and symptoms. Eren panics at first before he realises that, if Marco really does know, then he’s extending his hand out for Eren anyway.

It’s - well it’s the nicest thing anyone’s ever for him.

“Thank you,” Eren replies and his words waver a little. “Really.”

Marco offers a brilliant smile. “Of course, Eren. Don’t hesitate to call me,” he pulls his cell phone out. “Do you have a cell number?”

“Not yet, but Mikasa’s talking about getting me one,” Eren tells him. As he finishes the sentence, Marco’s phone chimes, and Marco looks down at it, that brilliant smile growing even wider. It must be a text, because he starts typing out a reply immediately.

“Jean?” Eren asks.

Marco looks up with wide eyes and a blush that obscures his freckles. The smile on his face turns a little sheepish. “That obvious?”

“Oh, I -” Eren coughs, and he can feel himself blushing too. “I just kind of assumed - I mean I thought that maybe you were - er, dating.”

“I wish,” Marco rolls his eyes, and then the blush spreads from his cheeks down his neck. “Oh, please don’t tell MIkasa I said that. Jean has like this huge crush on her and I wouldn’t want to get in between them.”

_Marco really is the nicest guy around_ , Eren thinks. He resists the urge to gag at the thought of Jean and Mikasa hooking up though. Honestly, Mikasa has never really been interested in anybody, and Eren’s even heard her throw the term _aromantic_ around, but he’s not educated enough to know what it truly means. He thinks back on the flirty smile he saw Jean give Marco yesterday. He’s not sure if Jean’s just leading Marco on, or if he meant it, and so Eren just nods in assent. Maybe he’ll ask MIkasa about it later.

Marco lets him stick around for a little while longer, but eventually Eren decides that he has to grow up and go apologize to his sister, so he stands to go, waving goodbye to Marco, who gives a cheeky grin back.

It’s a little cooler out when Eren steps outside, and he zips up his jacket, shivering against the light breeze. Levi and company are outside of the arcade when Eren steps out, Levi smoking another cigarette and Isabel laughing and shoving Farlan playfully. When Levi sees Eren, he nods at him to come closer, and after a second of hesitation, Eren does.

“Hanji’s throwing a party on Saturday,” he says, and when he talks smoke billows out of his mouth. “You can come if you want. You could even bring those shitty not-friends of yours.”  He holds out a slip of paper to Eren, who takes it.

“Oh, thank you,” Eren stutters out, inspecting the paper. There’s an address written on it and a phone number with the initials “L.A.” next to them. Isabel giggles and Farlan nudges her; the blush from before crawls back on Erens face with a vengeance.

  
Levi nods at him and turns to cross the street without another word, Isabel and Farlan following. Eren watches them go for a moment, before looking back down at the slip of paper, and tucking it into his jacket pocket. He’s never been invited to a party before and there’s something akin to excitement in his chest. After all, his therapist did say social activity would be good for him. Aside from a little anxiety, Eren could handle meeting all of MIkasa’s new friends. A party might be a little too much, but he thinks he’ll run it by Mikasa anyway. Just in case.

He tries not to overthink Levi inviting him to a party.

 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a heads up that my only experience with like mental hospitals and such are Circles of Care down in Florida and inaccurate TV shows so my "If I offend anybody, punch me in the face" still stands*~
> 
> Also ayo I have a [tumblr](http://pavelmccoy.co.vu/) thing where I post lots of gay anime boys.

When Eren gets back to the house, Mikasa is curled up on the sofa with her scarf wound tight around her neck and a thick blanket thrown over her. She stands the moment Eren enters the living room, looking at him with relief in her eyes.

“I”m really sorry,” Eren says the moment he feels like he can speak without his voice breaking. “I - I just - I’m really angry at myself and I take it out on you and you don’t - you don’t deserve that.” He sniffles and rubs his nose with the back of his hand.

Mikasa is enveloping Eren in a hug in the next second; not one of those fragile hugs where she barely touches him, but a real one, like the one he got from Krista yesterday. He hasn’t gotten a warm hug like this from Mikasa in what feels like years and he bursts out crying without really meaning to at all.

“I just wish you loved yourself more,” Mikasa whispers to him, putting a hand to his hair to soothe him.

It’s a few minutes before Eren can calm his sobs down, and when he does they turn into hiccups that hurt his throat. Mikasa looks him in the eye and keeps her hands on either side of his face. “You’re just adjusting, it’s only temporary. You won’t always feel like this, I promise.”

It’s the only thing she could have ever said to make him feel better. Mikasa’s funny like that.

Eren’s still feeling awful for hurting Mikasa in the first place - for everything really: who he is, how he behaves. Mikasa forgives him easily enough, but it’ll be a long while before Eren can learn to forgive himself. He sits with the couch on her for a little while, watching old _Friends_ reruns. He misses Armin, he realises as he watches. Armin was the only real friend he had in the hospital, and even in the days Before the Hospital Eren had little more than acquaintances. He’s suddenly glad that his therapist works out of that building so that he can still stop by and visit him.

The sun is just setting when Eren hears the front door open, awoken from the light sleep he had begun to fall into. Mikasa sits up immediately, eyes going a little wide before she schools her face into her usual serene expression. It doesn’t register at first, but when Grisha Jaeger walks into the room, suddenly Eren’s chest feels funny and his stomach flips.

“Eren,” he says in that loving, caring tone Eren’s so sure he puts on just for show. “Hello, son.”

“Dad,” Eren shoots back but doesn’t make any move to walk towards him.

“You’re looking healthy,” Eren’s dad replies and Eren resists the urge to roll his eyes. Of course thats the first thing he points out.

“Yeah, Mikasa,” he puts an emphasis on her name. “Has me on this diet the doctors suggested.” He’s not sure why he tells his dad this. Maybe he wants him to feel bad.

Grisha sighs and sits down in the spare rocking chair that they’ve had for years. He puts his head in his hands, and, with a tired voice, says, “I’m sorry I haven’t been by to see you. You know how I work at the hospital in the city, it’s just easier staying there when I have to pull these kinds of shifts.” He meets Eren’s eyes for the first time. “I’m off for the next few days.”

“I have plans.” Eren climbs off the couch, Mikasa’s eyes following him. He really doesn’t want to see his dad right now, and the ever present anger issues brewing beneath the surface of his skin crawls back into his throat. He doesn’t mean to tear up and it just makes him that much more mad.

“Plans?” Dad looks thoroughly offended and Eren thinks he has no right to. “Doing what?”

  
“I have therapy tomorrow,” Eren snaps, and then shoves his hands into the pockets of the jacket he hasn’t taken off yet. He feels the slip of paper in there, and then, on a whim, says, “And I’m going to a get-together on Saturday.”

“Isn’t it a little soon for that?” Grisha looks up at Eren with a furrowed brow.

“My therapist said social activity is good for me.”

Some of the life drains out of Eren’s dad, like maybe he’s too tired to argue. Maybe he just doesn’t care. “As long as Mikasa is there to keep an eye on you, I guess it’s alright.” The anger in Eren’s throat expands. First of all, it’s not fair of Grisha to put that kind of burden on Mikasa. He’s been doing it ever since Mom died; it’s enough that Mikasa does it to herself, but it’s even worse when the _parental figure_ does, too. That, and it’s not like Eren was asking permission. He doesn’t need permission from his father.

Eren’s already gotten into one fight today, and would much rather avoid another one, so he mumbles something about being tired and heads towards his bedroom, ignoring the protests of his Dad saying,“Wait, son, I want to talk to you” and other shit that Eren doesn’t want to hear. He tries not to slam his bedroom door, but it closes loudly anyway, and he spends a minute leaning against it, pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes to keep the angry tears from leaking out.

To be honest, he’s just _disappointed_ at the lack of care that his father exhibited. Dads are supposed to care when their sons need help; they’re supposed to care when old sisters are taking care of the kids in the absent parents place. They aren’t supposed to vanish for days on end, and yeah, “work” but it’s not like Grisha ever propositioned they moved to the city. Eren wouldn’t have any qualms about it, and knowing Mikasa she wouldn’t have much either. In the end, Eren just feels unwanted and more like a waste of space than ever when his father is around. Maybe that’s part of the reason he’s so messed up.

Eren’s emotions are constantly swinging back and forth - one of the many side effects - and his therapist prescribed him mood stabilizers. Mikasa carefully monitors those too, keeping them locked away in a place that Eren can’t see, along with his anti-depressant and zinc pills. He takes them like he’s supposed to, but the stabilizers don’t always work, and that’s why he ends up crying and yelling and laughing too loud within an hour. It’s one of the many things he doesn’t like about himself.

Mikasa comes into Eren’s room a couple hours later, while he lays in bed and tries to focus on the poetry book Armin gave him. He sets it aside when she sits on his bed. She’s quiet, eyes looking around Eren’s room, and then behind her, at the pictures of Mom tacked on Eren’s wall. “Dad thinks it’s best he goes back to the city tomorrow.”

“Of course he does.”

Mikasa closes her eyes and exhales. “He thinks you need more time to adjust before he comes back and has a talk with you.”

“It’s just an excuse.”

“Eren.”

Eren turns on his side and stares at his wall. Mikasa sighs again and leans back against the same wall, avoiding the pictures so she doesn’t knock them down. “So what’s this ‘get-together’ you’re talking about?”

Eren looks over at her. “Actually, it’s a party.”

She raises an eyebrow, “A party? Like, spin the bottle, teenagers getting trashed, a party?”

  
Eren smiles and sits up, fetching his jacket from where he left it on the floor and taking out the piece of paper stowed in the pocket. “I ran into Levi when I went over to Marco’s and he invited me.”

“Wait,” Mikasa says, snatching the paper out of Eren’s hand. “Levi invited you to a party? Like _the_ Levi? Like Punk Guy Levi who I told you broke some guy’s arm?”

Eren frowns. “Well, yeah. He even said I could bring people.”

She studies the piece of paper for a second, as if to confirm it’s real, and then looks at Eren again. “I don’t know, Eren, I don’t trust him.”

Eren leans over to take the paper from Mikasa. “He said I was cool, it’d be fun. Maybe Jean and everyone would like to come. Well, maybe not Jean. I mean, he can come if Marco goes because Marco -” Eren closes his mouth before he can give too much away. “But, yeah.”

Mikasa just stares at him.

“Why are you looking at me like that?”  
  
“I just - Eren, a _party_? Do you know what kind of parties Levi throws? I mean,” she gestures at the paper still in Eren’s hand. “That’s at _Hanji’s_ place, and Hanji is just - well I mean they like - they’re the definition of party animal.”

“They sound like fun.”

“ _Eren_ , you,” she breaks off and rubs her temples. “I just don’t want you doing too much too fast, y’know?

“I just want to feel normal.”

Mikasa closes her eyes again and then says, “Fine, but I’m not letting you drink,” and Eren breaks out into a huge grin, crawling across the bed to throw an arm over her shoulder.

“You’re the best.”

“I know,” she smiles and it’s enough to warm even Eren’s heart.

~X~

Eren’s up extra early the next day for his therapy appointment, which is at ten in the morning, and Mikasa gripes about Eren’s eating schedule getting altered but hums contentedly when Eren eats anyway. She has Eren in her truck by eight thirty, this time popping in a Staind CD. It’s a little hard for Eren’s tastes but he doesn’t argue with it.

“You’re not gonna sit in the parking lot the entire time are you?” he asks her once they’re out on the road. “I wanted to visit Armin after my appointment. It might take a few hours.”

“No, I actually have plans with Jean.”

Eren quirks an eyebrow at her. “Oh?”

She rolls her eyes.”It’s not like that.”

“Are you sure,” Eren crosses his arms. “A little birdie told me that he has the hots for you.”

“Did that bird happen to be called Marco?”

Eren’s palms sweat like he’s betrayed Marco somehow. “Maybe.”

Mikasa rolls her eyes a second time. “Jean had a crush on me for maybe three minutes before Marco walked into the room and then it was all him, all the time. Marco’s just too nice to think anyone would be interested in him, let alone someone he likes, too. What Jean and I are doing are setting up this really romantic venue so Jean can get over himself and Marco can get over himself and they can finally go on a date.”

She sounds so invested in it that Eren can’t help but laugh. He reflects on what Marco told him. “Marco’s the nicest guy I’ve ever met.”

“Yeah, he’s a good one,” Mikasa says with a fond smile. “I mean, he has this terrible habit of taking care of the entire world before himself, but y’know.”

“Sounds like someone else I know,” Eren smirks.

Mikasa rolls her eyes for a third time.

~X~

Eren’s therapist, Dr. Pyxis, is a gentle old man with laugh lines around his eyes and mouth and a patience level of probably hundred. Back in the early days, when Eren first came to the hospital, he put with Eren’s screaming and cursing at him about wanting to go home without even blinking. Eren thinks he owes Dr. Pyxis a gift basket, even if the guy doesn’t understand how teenagers really work.

His office is adorned with happy, motivational posters, and pain charts that say, “on a scale of one to ten, how do you feel!” with cartoon faces to depict each level. The worst-pain-I’ve-ever-felt cartoon faces describes Eren pretty accurately, he thinks. There’s a large potted plant in one corner that makes Eren sneeze every time he walks in the room, but Pyxis always goes on about how other living things in the room make good companions. (Apparently the hospital won’t let him get a therapy dog, but he keeps pushing for one.)

Pyxis spends a few minutes reviewing Eren’s charts and paperwork before sitting across from him in those comfy red chairs, crossing his legs and analyzing Eren’s face. “So, how’s being back home?”

Eren shrugs nonchalantly. “It’s all right. MIkasa’s looking out for me. I met some of her friends.”

“Oh, that’s great, how did that go?”

Eren contemplates telling his therapist about Levi but ultimately decides against it. “Alright. They’re nicer than I expected, and didn’t point out -” he breaks off. “Well, how I look.” Aside from Isabel, but that’d be getting into Levi and Eren’s not ready to go down that path.

“You’re worth more than your appearance, Eren,” Pyxis reminds him. It’s not the first time he’s heard that, and it most likely won’t be the last. Eren knows it’s true but it doesn’t change his opinion of himself.

“I’m really glad you’ve been keeping your schedule,” Pyxis says, flipping through those folders again. “Keep it up and you’ll be healthy in no time.”

A sudden ache shoots through Eren’s chest. Getting healthy means gaining weight and he knows that getting _healthy_ is one thing, but his brain just keeps screaming at him that putting on weight is a bad idea. His head is always doing a constant battle: knowing that he needs to gain weight, hates when people point out how thin he is vs. the irrational fear of gaining even a single pound. Mikasa threw out their scale months ago, and she won’t let him go outside to exercise at all. He does sit-ups and steps in his bedroom when he can, but he’s been trying to cut back. Forcing himself to stop isn’t that easy.

“Have you seen your father at all?” Pyxis asks then and the ache in Eren’s chest spreads to his fingers. They’ve been trying to get to the root of Eren’s daddy issues since Day 1 and it’s probably his least favourite thing to talk about, besides his body image.

“He came home last night,” Eren replies, curling a hand into a fist and staring down at it. “We didn’t talk much.”

“Why not?”

“Because he doesn’t care,” he snaps, and almost feels guilty for it . “He’s just, ‘Oh Eren, I have to work, sorry I couldn’t pick you from the mental place you’ve been staying in for four months’, ‘Sorry I didn't visit you in those four months even though you’re my only son and I haven’t paid any attention to you since your mom died’.” Eren’s voice cracks on the last one. “I just want him to act like a real dad.”

The thing about Dr. Pyxis is that he’s able to cut deep into Eren’s emotions without having to try at all. Eren’s not sure if it’s because he’s just that good, or if Eren himself is just a really emotional person. Probably a little bit of both.

“Remember a few weeks ago, when I told you you need to cut the toxic people from your life?” Pyxis starts in that serious tone he takes on when he really wants Eren to listen to what he has to say.

“I can’t just cut him out, he’s my _dad_.”

“I know. That’s why we need an antidote,” Pyxis stands and goes to his bookshelf, pulling out one of those many self-help books. Tucket in a folder is a piece of paper - Dr. Pyxis loves giving Eren homework. “I want you write down everything your dad makes you feel. Write down all the curses and the insults and then rewrite it, and rewrite it, and keep rewriting until the anger is drained and you can talk to him about these things without getting mad. Think you can do that for me?”

He hands Eren the piece of paper with a summary of the instructions and a word bank full of all those “feeling” words. Eren pushes down a groan and nods. “Okay.”

“Good.”

Eren also avoids telling Dr. Pyxis about the party, knowing that he won’t be on board with it - ‘too much, too soon”. In hindsight, Eren supposes it is, but he’s not going to pass up the invitation. Like he told Mikasa, he wants to feel normal, but more than anything he wants others to think he’s normal.

Dr. Pyxis lets him go a few minutes early so Eren can talk to Armin. He runs downstairs and goes through the sign-in motions, and when they finally let him see Armin, his friend is sitting in the cafeteria, hunched over a sketchpad. The sight makes Eren incredibly happy - Armin loves to draw, and it’s one of the few things that calms him down.

Eren announces his presence with footsteps and the clearing of a throat - Armin hates surprises and being snuck up on. When Armin looks up and sees Eren, he breaks out into a huge grin and jumps to his feet. “Eren!”

It’s the happiest Eren’s ever seen him, and the brilliant smile doesn’t fall off his face when Eren sits next to him. “How’s outside?” Armin asks without preamble. “How’s Mikasa, what have you been doing?”

“Slow down,” Eren laughs. “It’s alright, I’m dealing. Mikasa’s being Mikasa, y’know, keeping an eye on me. I met some of her friends.”

Armin’s eyes widen. “How did that go?”

Eren has to stifle another laugh remembering it. “They’re really nice, actually, except for this one kid, Jean. He got into a fight when I met them, with this literal punk guy.”

“Literal, like literally, actually, a real life punk with the coloured hair and everything?”

“The walking stereotype,” Eren tells Armin with a snicker. “I ran into him, not Jean, the other guy, after, and he - well he’s pretty cool actually. He invited me to a party.”

Armin’s smile wobbles a little bit and Eren’s stomach drops; of course Armin would lecture him on how it’s a bad idea. “A party?” he repeats. “I don’t know, Eren, aren’t those really loud, and - and rambunctious and they have all those _people_ -” he breaks off in a hiccup.

Eren rolls his eyes, “Yeah, yeah, but Mikasa will be there, and all of her friends, and I mean, I’ll be fine. I don’t mind being around people as long as they don’t talk to me.”

Armin looks at him incredulously, but let’s it slide. “Well, I suppose it is exciting. The only exciting thing that’s happened here is they changed the pudding back to chocolate and they’re trying out group therapy.” He shakes his head. “But they’re doing this art contest thing at the end of the month,” he flushes. “I was thinking about maybe entering.”

“You should,” Eren encourages loudly. “Armin, you’re the best, you could totally kick their asses.”

“You really think so?” Armin’s whole face lights up.

“Yes, definitely, one hundred percent.”

“Okay, if you say I should do it.”

Eren gets an hour with Armin, in which Eren describes all of Mikasa’s friends in more detail - “Jean’s the guy who got in the fight, he’s a mechanic and obnoxious, but I think he’s gonna hook with this guy Marco. Marco’s really nice, like really nice, they’re polar opposites, it’s kind of weird. Then there’s Ymir and Krista, and I think they’re dating too. Ymir seems kind of rude, but I didn’t really hear her that much so, but Krista’s also really sweet. And Sasha and Connie are really funny. Sasha really likes food.” - and Armin tells him about how there’s this new patient who’s been showing up to group therapy. She doesn’t stay at the hospital, apparently, and so Armin suggests that Eren maybe talk to Dr. Pyxis about attending to. It doesn’t seem too terrible of an idea, and so Eren tells him okay.

Mikasa is there not much later to pick him up, and Armin’s parting words are, “Keep eating, okay?” Eren agrees to that too because he owes Armin that much.

“Are you finally going to let me take you shopping?” Mikasa asks as soon as Eren is in the car.

“Right now?”

“Not if you don’t want to,” she looks over at him sideways. “But I’m willing to go right now.”

Eren stares out the car window and contemplates it for a moment. He’s in a better mood today then he has been in a while, and he’d be stupid not to try to keep it up. He’s not sure going shopping for clothes would do that - it might even kill it completely because changing rooms and mirrors. But then again, he’d be spending time with Mikasa.

“Okay.”

Mikasa looks over at him in surprise. “Really?”

“Yeah, sure.”

The smile on her face is worth it, he thinks.

 

~X~

Eren, and Mikasa for that matter, aren’t really much for shopping sprees. The only time they’ve ever gone genuine _clothes_ shopping was before school started, and it was never anything fancy. The nicest retail store in town is a K-Mart and so Mikasa suggests maybe going to the outskirts of the city.

Eren’s hesitant at first - he never liked going into the city to begin with, but he hopes that maybe the outskirts won’t be so packed. When he gives the okay, Mikasa smiles again, and they end up in a small-scale mall that even lacks a food court.

“Aren’t these places expensive?” Eren asks, following Mikasa inside a Macy’s outlet. He keeps himself huddled in his jacket, hands in the pockets; the paper that Levi gave him is still in there and he folds it between his fingers.

“They aren’t, like, Chanel,” Mikasa says, dragging Eren towards a section of button-ups and blazers. Eren doubts that those are appropriate for a party like the one they’re going to. “We’ll be alright, I have enough.”

Eren wonders how much Dad gives Mikasa a month. It occurs to them just then that she’s probably spent these past four months by herself in the house; Dad wasn’t going to be any less of a deadbeat just because Eren wasn’t there. He thinks, anyway. It must’ve been awfully lonely and a raw, empty feeling opens a hole in Eren’s chest. His good mood diminishes a little.

“So, what all the guys wear these days are these blazers over casual outfits and you think it’d look really stupid but for some reason it just kind of works really well,” Mikasa tells him, taking things off the clothes rack. “Just throw these on over their clothes, I’ll tell you what looks good.”

Eren thinks Mikasa’s keen on his aversion to mirrors, and he’s grateful for it. He sheds his jacket and takes one of the hangers Mikasa is holding out to him. The material is thick and feels expensive in his hands; he resists the urge to look at the price tag.

“I don’t know, Mikasa,” he says after he’s tried a few on. “These feel a little hipsterish.”

 

“Hipster is in,” she reassures, inspecting him. They all hang a loosely off his frain, even though he knows they’re already small, but Mikasa doesn’t comment on this. “That’s the one, I think.”

Eren takes her word for it and sheds the blazer to put it back on it’s hanger, swapping it out for his jacket. Mikasa puts everything else back and then proceeds to drag him towards another section. “You need new pants,” she informs him. She’s not wrong.

In the end he just ends up with the same outfits he has at home in a smaller size, piled into his arms as Mikasa then leads him towards the opposite side of the store. “I need a dress.”

“A dress?” he repeats, staring at her blankly. Eren doesn’t think he’s ever seen Mikasa in a dress in their entire lives. “Why?”

“Eren,” Mikasa shakes her head. “This is a Levi party. Well, a Hanji party. Not just anybody gets invited.”

“Well I did,” Eren shrugs. “I mean, if I can get invited when I barely know the guy, then it can’t be too hard, right?”

Mikasa just kind of looks at him. “He must really like you.”

Eren feels his entire face and neck flush.

Mikasa moves on to pull dress after dress off the racks, and leaves Eren standing outside the dressing room while she tries them all on. It’s a seemingly endless parade of red and turquoise and weird shades of green. Eren shakes his head furiously at anything without sleeves which earns enough eyerolls from Mikasa that, if he had a quarter for each one, he could probably buy a shiny new convertible.

Eren’s tired and lethargic after only an hour - he’s been out for a long while today, and this body is still adjusting to the new diet and everything - so Mikasa ends up picking a red number that Eren thinks is too tight and too short and taking them home.

Eren dreams without nightmares that night for the first time in a long while.

 


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Agh trigger warnings for underage drinking and anxiety~*  
> Also!!! I know how important Hanji's gender identity is to people so I tried my best to represent them as ~agender~ and if I'm going about it all wrong please inform me because I am so completely terrified of offending people it's insane. 
> 
> Bless you all for the comments and the kudos kisskiss<3  
> (Also I think somebody asked how old Eren was, and at this point he's 15 but I touch on the whole age thing in the next chapter for better clarification~)

“Wait, you got invited to a _Levi_ party?” Jean asks staring at Eren with narrowed eyes. “Like he straight up said, ‘hey you’re invited to this party’? And he said we could come?”

“Yes,” Eren sighs. Mikasa and him met up with the gang thirty minutes ago and everything was just dandy until Mikasa mentioned the invitation. All at once, everyone grew silent and there eyes snapped to Eren. Jean was the first to dare to speak. “His exact words were, ‘Hanji’s throwing a part on Saturday -’”

“Hanji?!” Sasha cries at the same that Jean goes, “Wait, it’s tonight?”!

“Uh, yeah. He didn’t say what time though.”

Jean waves his hand, “Doesn’t matter. Basic party etiquette is you don’t show up until eight pm at the _earliest_.” He rests his elbows on the tabletop, steepling his hands together and pressing his nose to them, as if deep in thought.

“Okay, yeah,” Sasha intervenes. “But _Hanji_ is throwing it.” Her eyes grow wide. “Hanji always has the best food.”

“Well, are we going to go?” Krista asks innocently, and Jean relaxes his pose to point a finger at her.

“Krista, my sweet, _of course_ we’re going to go! Eren, my man, I don’t know what you’re doing but keep it up! At this rate, I’ll be able to get back at that stupid midget in no time -”

 

“Jean, you’re not fighting him!” Marco protests and there’s a squeak in his voice that sounds like fear.

“Oh come on, Marco, baby, I could totally take him,” Jean boasts, slinging an arm around Marco’s shoulder.  Eren’s willing to assume that the date Mikasa help set up went over well. “That day was a fluke, and he fought dirty, I’m totally ready now.”

“Fuck that,” Ymir says with a shake of her head. “You even think about fighting Levi, horseface, and I’ll drag you out of there myself. I’m not getting kicked out from a party like that because you can’t keep your angry, teenage, _boy_ hormones in check.” Krista snorts loudly from her seat next to Ymir and blushes immediately, covering her nose with her hand.

“Wait, but if we’re going,” Connie leans forward, holding his hands out to get the groups attention. “Then shouldn’t we be getting ready, like, _right now_.”

Sasha is the first to stand up, “I’ll get the snacks!” And then she’s dashing out of the diner, Connie trailing after her. The group disbands quickly with laughter, and for a moment, Eren is confused before Mikasa turns to him and says, “We always get ready at my - our house whenever we go out. Don’t ask me how it started because I honestly don’t remember.”

 

Eren laughs lightly in response.

After Eren and Mikasa get home to move anything breakable out of the way and lock the pantry door so it’s not raided by their friends, Sasha and Connie are the first to show up, Sasha carrying an armful of various snack items, including a giant bag of Lays and yogurt pretzels. Connie has a two liter soda tucked under his arm and when Mikasa warns him to tap the lid before opening it, he smiles mischievously and shakes the bottle vigorously.

“Connie, if you open that in my living room I swear to God -”

Connie goes to twist the lid off but Mikasa lunges at him and takes the bottle for him, handing it to Sasha who holds it high over her head. “That’s not even fair,” Connie protests, jumping for it; he’s a good few inches shorter than the girls.

Jean and Marco are next, Jean wearing fresh clothes that actually aren’t grease-stained for once, and Marco in a plain button-up. Marco looks incredibly flushed, Jean’s wearing this proud smirk, and it doesn’t take long for Connie and Sasha to call them out on it, the soda bottle forgotten on the sofa, next to Eren who’s seated on it.

Sasha bounces over to offer Eren a small bag of Cheetos, yogurt pretzels already stuffed in her cheeks. “Oh, no thank you,” Eren turns her down, and is relieved when she just shrugs and opens it herself, shoving a Cheeto into her mouth before she’s even swallowed the pretzels. Eren wrinkles his nose at the idea of what that might taste like.

Krista shows up with Ymir in tow, wearing a pretty, pastel-pink dress that goes to her knees and carrying a makeup bag the size of a briefcase.

Within minutes, the girls are stumbling over each other to get to the bathroom, and Eren thinks he hears Krista and Sasha bickering over who gets the curling iron first. Connie flops down on the couch next to Eren, still wearing the outfit from the diner and looks over at Eren. “This party is going to be so hella.”

“Connie, don’t say hella,” Jean says in a deadpan voice, and takes a seat in the old rocking chair (for some reason, that irks Eren, but he doesn’t say anything), pulling Marco onto his lap. Marco yelps and blushes but stays put.

Connie bounces to his feet, “Eren, do you have any tunes?”

 

“ _Connie_ ,” Jean sighs, pinching the bridge of his nose between two fingers. “Don’t say tunes.” Marco snickers into his palm and Eren suppresses a grin.

“Mikasa has her CD collection over by the stereo,” Eren points towards the hallway, where there’s a low table with a stereo system balanced on top of it. As far as Eren can remember, it’s cranky and old and only plays every other track, but it’s not broken yet so they’re hanging onto it.

Eren watches as Connie shakes his head and mutters over Mikasa’s music, while Jean pulls Marco down to whisper something into his ear. Marco keeps making these yelping noises, face going red, and Eren decides he really doesn’t want to know what Jean’s saying to him. The sounds of the girls still bickering filters from the bathroom and it occurs to Eren that maybe these aren’t just Mikasa’s friends, but his too. Eren can’t really recall ever having a real friend, aside from Armin, that he hung out and went to parties with, and the laughter brings life to the house that Eren hasn’t experienced since before the accident.

When he puts it all into perspective, it appears as if things are actually getting better. There’s a tingling feeling in his chest that he dares to call hope. Maybe he’ll be able to heal after all.

Connie has finally seemed to find something in Mikasa’s collection that he likes - an old dusty tape that Eren thinks might be a mixed one - and pops it in with a cackle. The opening bars of _Can’t Touch This_  ring out and Jean groans loudly. “Not this song.”

“I’m sorry, Jean,” Connie calls, turning the stereo up louder. “I can’t hear you, say that again?”

 

“I’m gonna kill you, oh my God,” Jean buries his face in his hands and Marco’s shaking with silent laughter, eyes watering.

Krista sticks her head out of the hallway, half of her hair done in curls and eyelids sparkling with a shade of pink that matches her dress. “I love this song!”

“I hate this song!” Jean cries and Marco’s laughing so hard that he almost falls off of Jean’s lap. “Please, Connie, I’m begging you, turn it off. I’ll even let you say hella and tunes.”

Connie just laughs at him and reaches a hand towards Krista. “May I have this dance?”

Krista takes it with a giggle and they dissolve into a very poor rendition of the MC Hammer dance and Marco’s stifled giggles turn into pure roars of laughter, with Jean still covering his face and shaking his head. “I can't believe Ymir and Sasha even let you guys out in _public_!”

Eren’s laughing too - really hard, harder than he thinks he’s laughed in his entire life and he realises suddenly that he hasn’t felt this happy since . . Well, for months. Probably years, even, and the revelation just makes him laugh that much harder, until his sides hurt and he’s gasping for air.

It’s the best feeling in the world, and if there’s anything Eren misses about himself, before the hospital, before the sickness, before the accident, it was the ability to laugh.

Everything about it makes him feel _normal_ and he couldn’t have asked for anything else

~X~

Hanji’s house is far bigger than Eren is expecting. It’s two stories, and the lights are shut off with these stereotypical multi-coloured party lights streaming through the open windows.There’s a thumping bass that immediately gives Eren a headache and he wonders how the neighbors haven’t called about a noise complaint yet. There are cars littered all over the lawn, some people people seated on their hoods, others with what looks like spray paint over the windows. Eren supposes Mikasa wasn’t joking when she said “party animal.” The excitement that Eren’s been feeling morphs into anxiety and he takes deep breaths through his nose.

“Are you sure you can handle this?” Mikasa asks for the fifth time, putting a hand on his shoulder. “It’s okay if you can’t, we can just go home-”

“No,” Eren sits up straighter and forces his breathing to even out. “No, I’m fine. I can do this.” _I’m normal._

Mikasa doesn’t look 100% convinced, but she nods anyway and let’s Eren stumble out of the truck. The group is waiting on the lawn, staring at the house with the same awestruck expressions Eren’s sure he himself is wearing.

“I feel too - too _uncool_ to be here,” Connie says in a low voice, eyes wide and shaking his head.

“Don’t be a chickenshit,” Ymir rolls her eyes and laces her fingers through Krista’s. “We look like idiots, let’s go inside.”

“Wait, I need to like, mentally prepare myself,” Connie replies, pressing his fingers against his temples whilst closing his eyes. He hums to himself for a second, even as Sasha begins to push him towards the door by his shoulders.

“Eren,” Mikasa draws Eren’s attention, gently grabbing his upper arm. “If you get uncomfortable or anxious or anything, just stick by me, okay?”

Eren opens his mouth to say, “I’m fine,” but what he says instead is, “Thanks, Mikasa.” She gives a soft smile and a nod and then Eren’s stepping foot into the first real party he’s ever been to.

Once inside, the thumping bass reveals to be part of some techno song that Eren doesn’t recognize, ringing through the tightly packed opening rooms. There’s a blinding, green, strobe light that flashes across the crowd; the room is far too small for this many people to be in it, Eren thinks. When he looks behind him he sees that their group has already lost their formation, Mikasa standing out a few feet back in her red dress. There’s already somebody talking to her and Eren’s anxiety rises a little.

He wasn’t sure if MIkasa would even know anyone here - Eren knows for sure that he doesn’t, and suddenly he feels entirely out of place, like he’s sticking out like a sore thumb. Before Eren has time to make a decision completely and duck out of the house to sit outside for a minute, there’s a low voice in his ear, “You never called me.”

Eren probably jumps fifteen feet in the air and turns around quickly; at first, he doesn’t see anybody, but when he looks down he sees Levi staring back up at him with a raised eyebrow. Because of the tight space, they’re pressed incredibly close, and when the strobe light dances over Levi’s face Eren notices that his eyes are actually blue.

“What?” Eren gasps out like an idiot.

“I said, you never called me,” Levi raises his voice, changing the pitch but not the emotion, and when he speaks Eren sees a flash of silver in his mouth. A tongue piercing? “I gave you my number.”

Eren recalls the piece of paper sitting on his desk at home; in all honestly, it had never occurred to him to call Levi. He had been so wrapped up in the idea of being actually invited to an actual place that the concept of _calling_ seemed obsolete. “I - I’m sorry.”

Levi squints at him and then takes Eren’s wrist, dragging him away from the crowd and through the open back porch door; it’s quieter out here, the night air chill and revealing nothing but stars and the faint sound of crickets chirping. There are a few stragglers on the back porch, and they look over at them with disinterest before returning to their conversation with each other. “God, fuck, I hate that fucking music,” Levi curses as he sits down on the raised wooden porch. After a split second, Eren does too.

Levi pulls a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of that same leather jacket Eren’s seen him in before, pulling one out by the teeth and offering the pack to Eren. “You smoke?”

“Er, no.” Eren leans away.

“Good,” Levi nods. “Cigarettes are disgusting.” As he says this, he lights his. His lighter is decorated with the AC/DC logo.

“I owe Hanji twenty bucks,” Levi sighs between puffs. “I told them you weren’t gonna show.”

Eren doesn’t know how to respond.

“So, why didn’t you call?” Levi fixes his intense gaze on Eren.

“Oh, I - uh,” Eren rubs the back of his neck with his hand. “I didn’t know you wanted me to.”

“I wouldn’t have given you my number if I didn’t want you to call, stupid.” Levi flicks his cigarette and Eren wonders if he should be letting the ashes fall into the dry grass. He studies Eren’s face for a moment, and Eren feels like he’s being put under a microscope and examined. He wants to look away but he can’t seem to be able to.

Levi suddenly reaches over and pokes Eren between the eyes, who blinks rapidly in surprise. “One of your eyes is a few shades darker than the other.”

“W-what?” Eren asks, rubbing his forehead.

“Heterochromia.” Levi  takes another drag of his cigarette.“Where have you been?”

Eren’s stomach does something funny. “Um?”

Levi rolls his eyes, “It’s a small town and I didn’t meet you until a couple days ago. You aren’t usually hanging around those dorks, so, where’ve you been? Did you just move here or something? Vacation?”

Eren thinks of the Florida Lie that Mikasa conjured up, about how she said she didn’t feel as if she was the one that should decide if others should know the truth. Eren’s not ready for anyone to know anything yet, especially this Levi guy he barely knows. “I was in Florida.”

“You’re awfully pale for someone from Florida.”

Eren’s ears burn. “I was just - vacationing there. Near Orlando. You know, Disney World and stuff.”

Levi quirks an eyebrow and Eren observes that they’re unnaturally thin. He wonders if Levi gets them done. “I went to Disney Land once. I threw up on the teacups.”

Eren barely manages to stifle a laugh into the back of his hand.

“Don’t laugh, it was the most disgusting thing that’s ever happened to me,” Levi chastises, poking Eren’s forehead again. “But I puked on my father figure and he’s a homophobic, sexist dick so I guess it was worth it.”

Eren can’t help but smile. “If it makes you feel better, my dad’s a dick, too.”

“Why would that make me feel better,” Levi deadpans and Eren feels his smile slipping. “I may be kind of a cunt sometimes but having a deadbeat for a dad _sucks_. I wouldn’t even wish that shit on my ex-boyfriend.”

Eren feels like he should apologise for something, but Levi stands up before he can. “Come on, I have to prove to Hanji that you actually showed up.”

Eren scrambles to his feet and Levi grabs the sleeve of his blazer between two of his fingers, leading Eren back inside the house. The song has changed to something more mellow, and the crowd has thinned. Eren sees Jean and Marco in one corner, Jean with his mouth pressed against Marco’s neck. When he pulls away, he sees Eren, being tugged along by Levi and his eyes go wide. He mouths something to Eren that Eren barely catches, but he thinks it might’ve been, _“Get ‘em!”_

Levi leads Eren up the stairs, where a couple of different people hanging out on the staircase do a double take, their eyes as wide as Jean’s. One of them is Mikasa, holding a plastic up and frowning at some buff, blonde guy waving his arms at her. When she sees Eren and Levi, she nearly drops her cup.

When their eyes meet, Eren just widens his and shakes his head, shrugging a little with his free arm. She continues to watch Levi pull Eren along until their on the second floor, where there are far less people. There are some obscene noises coming from behind a closed door and Levi makes a gagging noise. “People are _disgusting_.”

Levi brings Eren to what looks like the master bedroom of the house. The door is ajar and inside are Isabel and Farlan, a pretty strawberry blonde, and somebody distinctly female in glasses, speaking in a loud voice about liberal rights or something similar, with everyone else staring at her.

“I owe you twenty bucks,” Levi says, announcing their presence. He holds up Eren’s arm by his sleeve. “This is that Eren kid I told you about.”

“Ooh!” Glasses coos; Eren wonders if this is the infamous Hanji. “You didn’t mention he was so _pretty_.” Hanji nearly runs towards Eren and gathers his free hand in both of her’s. “Call me Hanji, preferred pronouns they/their. Did this boring old guy bug you too bad?”

“Shut up, Hanji,” Levi says, finally releasing Eren’s sleeve to pull a wallet out of the back pocket of his jeans. “Here’s your stupid twenty bucks.”

“Sorry about this kid,” Hanji says, waving the twenty dollar bill in her - _their_ hand. “I can never resist betting Levi.” They lower their voice. “Mostly because he always loses, especially at strip poker, oh my God, one time we were playing and -”

 

“Hanji if you dont shut up I’m going to rip your shitty glasses off of your face and cram them down your throat,” Levi presses his fingers into his eyes and, with another of those sighs, crosses the room to sit on the bed. The pretty blonde girl gives him a sympathetic look.

“Don’t mind him, he’s always being so dramatic,” Hanji winks at Eren and then pulls him sharply towards the bed. “Come sit with us, I was just explaining to everyone why we shouldn’t trust Republicans.”

“Don’t listen to them,” Isabel rolls her eyes and grabs Eren’s other arm. He feels as if the two of them are going to split him in half. “They’re just bitter, come here. Argh, you’re still so thin!” She turns to Farlan. “Go get him some food from downstairs.”

Farlan makes a face, but Eren intervenes, “No, it’s alright, I’m not hungry.”

“Are you sure?” Isabel looks at Eren with wide eyes; at this point, Hanji has let go and Eren’s sitting on the edge of the bed between Isabel and Levi, who stares somewhere off to the right in disinterest. “Not even a little bit?”

“I’m sure.”

Isabel deflates a little and bumps her shoulder again Eren’s, nearly knocking him into Levi. “If you say so, little guy. But I’m not gonna stop bugging you until you even out,” she pokes Eren in the ribs. “You’re so quiet, tell us something about yourself.”

“Leave him alone, Isabel,” Levi says without looking towards them. “You’re probably scaring him.”

“I’m not scared,” Eren says hurriedly, and Levi turns to him with a raised eyebrow. He’s not, though, just a little overwhelmed. At least some of his anxiety has panned out. “I just - I -” he’s stuttering like an idiot and he mentally kicks himself.

Eren is rescued by the sound of someone knocking on the door; it’s the tattoo’d tall guy from the diner that started the whole fiasco with Jean in the first place, the one that Levi called Auruo. “I’ve come to whisk Petra away!” he announces with a toothy grin.

The blonde girl stands up. “To where?”

“It’s a surprise,” Auruo snickers, holding his hand out.

“You’re taking me downstairs to dance, aren’t you?” Petra crosses her arms.

“Finally, something that doesn’t sound like an awful idea,” Levi interjects, and he looks at Eren. It’s the first time Eren’s seen him smile and it’s - well, it’s nice. He extends a hand, “Want to come?”

Eren makes a vague squeaking sound; so does Hanji, but theirs is far louder. “I don’t know how to dance,” Eren admits.

“I’ll teach you.”

“I - sure,” Eren concedes and takes Levi’s hand; it’s warm.

During the trek downstairs, Eren notices that Mikasa is no longer on the stairs; a few of the others from before are, and they look at Eren and Levi’s hands linked with those same masks of surprise. It makes Eren’s chest burn.

Eren doesn’t know what he’s expecting when Levi leads him back down to the living room, Petra, Auruo, and even Hanji, all trailing after them.( A few people stop Hanji to compliment them on their party, which Hanji always takes with loud laughter and exaggerated bows.) He doesn’t know what to do with himself when the crowd parts like the Red Sea to let them all through; he almost loses it completely when Levi takes Eren’s hands and places them on either side of his waist. He’s small, Eren releases. A sick part of him is a little envious.

“The kids these days are into some gross thing called grinding,” Levi makes a face. “We’re not grinding.”

Eren bites his tongue.

“Just follow me, feel the music, all that poetic shit. And don’t step on me or I’ll step on you twice as hard.” And then Levi’s moving under Eren’s hands, putting one of his own on the back of Eren’s neck. The first thing Eren thinks is that he might be sweaty and gross, and he panics, but Levi doesn’t pull away, just buries his fingers into Eren’s hair. He maintains eye contact, even as Eren makes awkward clumsy attempts to follow his swaying.

“Loosen up, kid.”

Eren makes a sound that translates to something like _myyfeh?_ The music playing is some of that odd, techno stuff again, with guttural vocals too deep to make out the lyrics. Levi suddenly jerks to the left, causing Eren to nearly fall, to avoid somebody doing a very poor attempt at the moonwalk.

“Sorry, man,” the guy says, and Eren realises it’s Jean; as soon as he sees Levi, his eyes widen, and then follow Eren’s hand from it’s place on Levi’s waist all the way up to his face. “Holy shit.”

Levi spins them so fast Eren’s head feels like it’s stuffed full of cotton balls for a minute. His back is to Jean now, and he can feel the back of his neck growing hot under Levi’s hand.

“Eren,” Levi says his name, distracting him. “Hanji’s right, you are awfully pretty, but you’re absolutely shit at dancing.”

As soon as the song ends and morphs into something smoother, Levi’s hands drop; Eren draws his away too and he realises his palms are sweaty. He tries to inconspicuously wipe them on his jeans but doesn’t think that fares too well, judging by Levi’s signature raised eyebrow.

Levi studies Eren’s face for a moment. “Are you going to call me?”

“I - uh, yeah, sure, when?” Eren curls his hand into a fist, nails digging into his palm. He has no idea why Levi’s so intent on keeping him around.

Levi waves a hand. “Doesn’t matter.” He gives Eren another one of those smiles, making Eren’s chest constrict, and goes to walk away. Before he can completely lose his nerve, Eren calls after him. Levi turns back with both of his eyebrows raised.

 

“Why - why are you so,” Eren wrings his hands to stall, and then, all at once, “Why are you so interested in me?”

Levi blinks at him. “Because you look like you have a good story to tell.” And just like that, he’s disappearing into the crowd.

 


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was gonna wait until my week was up like I always do but then Chapter 58 was released and also there was hELLA ship hate on my dash so here I am out of pure spite I am a terrible person leave me be.
> 
> ////More triggers for underage drinking, driving under the influence, and off-screen alcoholism my precious honey angels
> 
> Another thanks for the comments and the kudos and everything and I'm sorry I don't reply to the comments but I promise that I read them and my heart does the thing and I smile so big don't ever change guys don't ever change.

Eren turns Levi’s words over and over in his head as he weaves through the house, attempting to find anyone he came here with. A story. Eren wonders if Levi could read _it_ on him in the same way that Marco could, and his throat swells at the thought. With what, he isn’t sure. He’s still thinking about it when he stumbles out the front door; Ymir and Krista are sitting on the porch, Krista with her head on Ymir’s shoulder and her eyes closed, while Ymir stares out into the night, a half empty beer bottle in her hand.

 

“Hey,” Eren greets, sitting on Ymir’s other side. Ymir nods at him and takes another swig of her drink. He figured his friends would be drinking, but it’s still surprising to see. He wants to ask Ymir, _Aren’t you driving home?_ , but thinks better of it. “Do you know where Mikasa, or, anyone, is?” he asks instead.

 

Ymir hums for a minute. “I’m pretty sure Marco’s blowing Jean in his car-”

 

Eren chokes on his own saliva.

 

“- and Connie and Sasha were by the snack table, last time I looked. Mikasa is. . .” Ymir trails off with a frown. “Actually, I don’t know where Mikasa is.”

 

“Mm,” Krista hums, opening her eyes and looking at Eren. “She’s with Reiner, I think. They went upstairs.”

 

“Reiner?”

“Blonde, buff,” she yawns. “One time he asked me where I bought my lipstick. It was kind of weird.”

 

Ymir laughs like it’s the funniest thing she’s ever heard and Krista looks up at her fondly. “Maybe he’s using Mikasa to try and convince himself he’s straight,” Ymir shakes her head. “I feel your pain, bud.”

 

“ _Ymir_ ,” Krista chastises, but Eren just snickers.

 

“So,” Krista sits up, resting her elbows on her knees and her chin in her hands, staring at Eren with her blue eyes wide. “When Jean and Marco came out here, Jean said he saw you dancing with Levi.” She lowers her voice when she says Levi’s name, like she’s saying a curse.

 

Eren’s palms tingle. “Yeah. Just for one song. Well, he danced, I just kind of . . . swayed.”

 

Krista lets loose a high pitched giggle; he thinks briefly that Krista and Hanji would get along. “That’s so _cute_!” She squeezes Eren’s forearm and leans closer. “Are you going to hang out with him again?”

 

Eren leans away a little. “Actually, he, ah, told me to call him.”

 

Krista giggles and squeezes Eren’s arm again. “Keep me updated, okay? You promise?”

“Historia,” Ymir sighs. “You’re doing that thing again.”

 

“Historia?” Eren repeats as Krista finally releases him to smack Ymir’s shoulder.

 

“Her real name,” Ymir answers, pushing her hand into Krista’s blonde hair to ruffle it. “But she thinks it’s ugly so she makes everyone call her _Krista_.” Ymir sticks her tongue out at the name.

 

“It is ugly!” Krista cries. “And I’m not, so keep calling me Krista, Eren.”

 

Just then, Mikasa steps out onto the porch, holding her scarf in one hand, and her shoes in the other. “Where is everybody?” Her speech is a little slurred and Eren frowns.

 

Ymir gives Mikasa the same answer she gave Eren - at the part about Jean and Marco, Mikasa smiles triumphantly - and then says, “Maybe we should go in and find Connie and Sasha.”

 

“They’re probably out back by the grill,” Mikasa informs them. “That Auruo guy from the diner found it and lit it up.”

 

“Hanji let him do that?” Eren asks without thinking and he’s met with three pairs of eyes boring into him.

 

Mikasa narrows hers. “That reminds me, why did Levi take you upstairs?”

 

“Levi took you upstairs?!” Krista shrieks, nearly falling into Eren’s lap in excitement. “Why didn’t you tell us!”

“It wasn’t really relevant,” Eren shrugs. “And I guess he made a bet with Hanji that I wouldn’t show. And then we -”

 

“And then they _danced together_!” Krista beams; if possible, Mikasa’s eyes narrow even further and Eren bites his bottom lip hard.

 

“You _danced_ with _Levi_?!” Mikasa says like somehow she’s personally offended by it. Eren doesn’t see what the big deal is and her tone makes him uneasy. The slur still in her words makes him even more so. “Isn’t he like, nineteen?”

 

“So?” Eren blinks up at her.

 

“ _So_! You’re fifteen, it’s just _weird_.”

 

“It could be worse,” Ymir defends on Eren’s behalf. “He could be like, thirty something.”

 

“She has a point,” Krista nods, a finger to her chin.

 

Eren just groans and stands up. “We _should_ find Connie and Sasha.” He pushes past Mikasa before she can protest; he knows that she’ll be grilling him about it later, and getting on his case. He understands her concern, but quite frankly, he finds it a little annoying. He’s been doing just fine with everything, far better than most people just getting out of a psych ward, and wishes she’d just have a little faith. It’s not like he’s _hooking up_ with Levi. Unlike her, who looks like she just got done hooking up with someone herself. Probably that Reiner guy. The thought makes Eren a little nauseous.

 

He finds Connie and Sasha cheering over a grill that looks like it’s entirely on fire. Auruo is cackling over it, Petra standing to the side with her arms crossed and frowning. Eren spots Levi and Hanji leaning against the backyard fence. A part of him wants to go over and talk to Levi just to get at Mikasa, but he’s too much of a chicken.

 

Instead he crosses the grass and tugs on Sasha’s sleeve. “Hey, we’re all looking for you guys.”

 

“You don’t want to leave do you?” Connie nearly jumps on Eren, frowning heavily. “It’s nowhere near sunrise! Come on, we have all night!”

 

Eren feels a little weary at the idea of staying here until sunrise.

 

“We’ll stay, Eren!” Sasha intervenes, and Auruo looks over his shoulder to spy on the conversation. “We’ll take my car home, it’s no big deal.” She throws herself at Eren in a hug that nearly sends him to the ground. “Tell everyone we’re alright!” She releases him and within the second, her and Connie are back to cheering over the roaring fire consuming the grill. Eren doubts there’s even anything on it.

 

“You’re that Eren kid from earlier,” Auruo points to him and winks. “Don’t worry, man, I’ll keep an eye on these two.”

 

Eren’s not sure he trusts Auruo to look after Connie and Sasha. In a weird way, he’s comforted by the fact that Levi is still there, too, looking towards the grill with that same disinterested look on his face. When he catches Eren’s eye, he winks again, like that day in the diner, and Eren’s flustered. He feels like he should gesture back, and in the end he waves. _Oh God, I’m so lame_ , he thinks even as Levi grins in reply.

 

He decides to get out of there before he can make a total fool of himself.

 

~X~

 

When Eren hears that Mikasa is still slurring her words, he makes a decision to get her home right away. He hates that she has to drive like that - it brings back terrifying memories, both of slick roadways and his mother, and of the days Before the Hospital - and before he tells her to get into the truck, he nearly doubles over in the grass, out of Mikasa’s sight, taking deep breaths and counting slowly to ten. He’s not angry, he knew this would happen, and it’s his fault for not monitoring it. Because yeah, Mikasa feels like she has to keep an eye on Eren, but sometimes, Eren feels like he has to keep an eye on her, too.

 

Ymir and Krista have prior commitments to get home with Jean and Marco, and so Eren doesn’t dare ask either of them. In the very least, Mikasa seems _aware_ and functional, which is better than things could be.

 

“Mikasa,” he begins when he can breathe even; his voice is still a little raspy, and Mikasa seems to sober up a little at the sound of it. “We should go home.”

 

“Okay,” she agrees without hesitation

 

Her driving isn’t wobbly at all, and Eren wonders how many times she drove home like this in the days Before the Hospital; it makes him clench his teeth. They haven’t talked about Mikasa’s drinking from back then, and Eren’s not sure when, or rather if, they ever will.

 

Eren talks to Mikasa while she tries to check her awareness. “So, what’d you and that Reiner guy talk about?”

 

MIkasa’s hands clench a little tighter on the steering wheel. “What’d you and Levi talk about?” Eren should’ve figured she wouldn’t let it go that easily.

 

Eren sighs and stares out at the road. “Nothing, really. We didn’t really talk. He told me I was a shit dancer and -” he stops himself from mentioning the calling Levi thing. He’s not sure if he wants Mkasa to know about that yet, knowing that she wouldn’t be happy about it at all. “I met Hanji.”

 

Mikasa arches an eyebrow, keeping her eyes ahead of her. “What are they like?”

“Eccentric.”

 

Mikasa bites into her lip as if to stifle a laugh. “I didn’t sleep with Reiner if that’s what you’re wondering.”

 

“I wasn’t.” He was.

 

“He couldn’t get it up.”

 

“Oh my God!” Eren pushes the heels of his hands into his eyes. “I didn’t need to know that.” He peeks sideways at Mikasa, and dares to say, “Ymir thinks he’s gay.”

 

“After tonight, so do I. I mean, I look pretty great in this dress,” Mikasa smiles and after a moment, Eren does too. Honestly, he’s just relieved that whatever she drank, and however much, isn’t getting to her.

 

They make it home safely, thanks to the grace of whatever god may be watching over them, and before Mikasa showers and goes to bed, Eren gives her the Tylenol bottle and tells her to keep a glass of water by her bedside. It’s not the first time he’s done this and his stomach clenches at the memories. But, he supposes that if he wants Mikasa to have faith in him that he’ll be alright, he needs to have some in her, too.

 

“Did you have fun?” Mikasa asks before they head their separate ways.

 

“Yeah,” Eren answers, thinking of Levi with a smile. “I did.”  
  
~X~

 

“I have a migraine,” Connie complains at Marco’s diner the next day, temple pressed against the table top. “Eren, why did you let us stay there.”

 

Eren grins. “Sasha said you guys would be alright.”

 

“Sasha is a dirty liar.” He sets his elbows on the table and presses his fingers into the corners of his eyes, pulling upwards. “She’s so sick she’s at home, man. Never listen to anything Sasha says. Especially not a party.”

 

Mikasa smirks at Connie. “You’re a lightweight.”

 

“Shut up, Miss I Can Down Three Vodka Shots In Under Five Seconds.” Connie flops his head back down on the table top.

 

“Wait,” Jean holds up both his hands. “We have to do our post party debrief. What did you all do after we got there. Marco and I went straight to that dancefloor, and definitely made out a little -”

 

“Jean, please don’t tell us the intimate details of your sex life,” Ymir begs. “Please.”

 

“Alright! I’ll spare you.” Jean spreads his hands further before laying his palms flat on the table’s surface. “And then we saw Eren _grinding_ against _Levi_ of all people -”

 

“I wasn’t grinding!” Eren says a little too loud; one of the other customers, an elderly lady, looks at him with genuine expaseration. “I was just _swaying_.”

 

“Swaying, grinding,” Jean says this as if he’s saying _tomayto, tomahto_. “The point is you were dancing with the punk that nearly broke my nose.” Jean puts a hand to his chest. “I felt so betrayed.”

 

“Don’t forget the part where they went upstairs together!” Krista calls, throwing an arm into the air like she’s answering a teacher’s question.

 

“Whoa, there, man,” Jean laughs. “You’ve got serious game.”

 

Eren groans and mimics Connie’s movement of slamming his forehead against the table. He feels Connie reach across and pat his shoulder. “It wasn’t like that, he just had me meet Hanji.”

 

“You met Hanji?!” Connie lifts his head. “Oh man, I can’t wait to tell Sasha this, she’s going to be so jealous.”

 

Eren looks up, too. “What about after you saw me?” he asks Jean in a desperate attempt to change the subject off of him and Levi, ignoring Connie.

 

Jean just gives a wicked grin and Eren’s suddenly sorry he asked.

 

“While Jean was getting his dick sucked -” Ymir cuts in, and at least three people at the table make gagging noises, Eren probably included, “Historia and I talked to this tattoo artist.” There’s sudden excitement in her tone that Eren’s never heard before. “He said he’d do my back tattoo for half off, which is great because I’m a broke ass bitch.”

 

“Ooh, that reminds me!” Krista claps her hands. “Ymir, show Eren your tattoo!”

Ymir rolls her eyes, but stands, rolling up the hem of her shirt to reveal a tattoo of a rose done across her hip; there are initials done in black inside one of the petals, but Eren can’t make them out. Ymir sits back down with a sigh, “It’s nowhere near as cool as the birds are going to be.”

 

“It’s pretty cool, though,” Eren says. Honestly, the idea of tattoos never appealed to him, but Ymir’s is incredibly well done.

 

The group dissolves into further talk of what they were up to that night, MIkasa going into full blown detail about what happened with Reiner - “And then he _apologised_ to me and said that he can’t stop thinking about this guy, Bertholdt, and I just kind of left.” - and Jean going into even _more_ detail about what he and Marco were up to, who’s working behind the counter without a clue, much to the chagrin of just about everyone.

 

Jean had to go back to work pretty early, so he left first, but not without kissing Marco goodbye which made Krista just plain _squeal_ in delight; she left next, Ymir following her as per usual, talking about getting stuff ready for school. It’s not for another month and a half, but apparently Krista’s involved in some kind of club or another. Maybe cheerleading.

 

The talk of going back to school makes Eren antsy; it’’ll be Mikasa’s senior year and Eren’s sophomore. He left  in the middle of the semester last year, and had to catch up in the hospital. He knows he’ll be met with an onslaught of questions, from teachers and peers alike, and the idea of it makes him bite into his knuckle anxiously.

 

Connie is the last to go, mentioning something about visiting Sasha,  and once he’s gone Mikasa leans forward to fold her arms and rest them on the table. In a low voice she says, “I’m sorry for drinking last night. I know it makes you nervous.” She plays with the end of her scarf. “I’m keeping it under control, though. But I won’t put you in that situation again.”

Eren shifts in his chair. “I trust you,” he tells her, because it’s what she needs to hear.

 

“It’s not going to be like it was before,” Mikasa looks up at him, and her grey eyes sparkle with unshed tears. “I promise.”

 

“I believe you,” Eren reassures. “Really, Mikasa, I do.”

 

She still appears to be beating herself up about it, but she does it silently. Eren meant what he said - he does trust Mikasa not to let her drinking get out of hand like it was Before the Hospital, and honestly, he’s proud of her for getting it under control in the first place. He’s been caught up in readjusting and feeling _normal_ that he forgot to give Mikasa and her demons much thought; immediately he feels selfish and guilty.

 

He’ll find a way to make it up to her, he decides. He just doesn’t know how yet.

  
~X~

 

Eren doesn’t call Levi right away.

 

He goes to, fiddling with the phone in his hand and carrying it with him for three days (thank God for wireless house phones), but always chickens out. He even dials Levi’s number once but hangs up before the first dial tone even rings out. Mikasa gives him funny looks but doesn’t seem to catch on; just keeps making sure he eats what he’s supposed to. She goes a little lax with the schedule, but just barely. “You have a doctor’s appointment after your therapy one on Friday,” she reminds him. Eren hates going to the doctor; it means being weighed.

 

On the third day, while Mikasa makes a trip to the bank to do whatever needs to be done to get the money that Dad wired to them, Eren lays in his bed and holds the phone high above his head, staring at it.

 

“Come on, Jaeger, it’s just one phone call,” he chants to himself for a good five minutes, reminding himself that the bank is in walking distance and Mikasa will be back at any moment, before he actually punches in the number. He stares at it for a little while longer, thumb hovering over the green call button. _It’s mocking me_. At last, he thinks, _fuck it_ and presses it before he completely loses his nerve.

 

The phone rings four times, and he’s not willing to wait for the fifth; just before he goes to hang up, it stops.

 

“Yo.”

 

Eren nearly drops the phone and sits up in a near-panic. “Uh - Levi? It’s Eren Jaeger - from, the party.” _Fuck._

 

“Eren,” Levi repeats and he doesn’t sound surprised at all. “How are you?”

 

Eren leans sideways against his wall. “I’m fine. You?”

 

“Bored,” Levi deadpans and Eren laughs softly. “I asked Hanji to get off their lazy ass and take us to the arcade but they’re too busy being a deadbeat. Something about the college life, I don’t really care.” Levi is so monotone about the whole thing that Eren can’t help but smile. “If somebody beats my high score in Pacman I’m gonna kick Hanji’s ass.”

 

Eren laughs so hard that tears well up in his eyes. “Oh good,” Levi says on the other line. “You understand my sense of humour.”

 

“Well, I’d go to the arcade with you,” Eren replies without thinking it through and tightens his grip on the phone, heart beating faster when what he said registers. _Oh God._

“Aren’t you nice,” Levi teases and Eren’s face heats up. “Meet me there tomorrow, hotshot. I’ll be the short one in all black. Can’t miss me.”

 

Eren’s blush spreads all the way down to his feet and he feels like one of those stereotypical teenagers in a bad YA novel. “O-okay.”

  
Levi makes a clicking sound and then hangs up, leaving Eren to stay at the phone and wonder if he just inadvertently asked Levi out on a date.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Babies going to the arcade how cute~*
> 
> Trigger maybe for a panic attack my poor baby Eren.   
> As always much thanks for the kudos and comments you are all so important I love you all very much kisskissfallinlove xoxo. You can always hit me up at arminauts.tumblr (too lazy to properly link forgive me.)

Mikasa can’t know about the arcade date (Is it really though? What if Erens just over thinking the entire thing?), he realises quickly.She’d, well, flip shit to be honest, and wouldn’t let him go at all, _especially_ not by himself. Sneaking out is entirely out of the question because, knowing her, she’d probably call the police. He can’t lie about going to see Armin because she’d insist on driving Eren there. He spends several hours staring at his bedroom ceiling, going over different scenarios in his head and frowning when none of them turn out well.

Eren’s not even entirely sure why he’s so keen on meeting up with Levi at all. He thinks maybe it has to do with that Levi said to him, about having a story to tell, and wanting to know what that _meant_. Maybe it’s because Levi didn’t tiptoe around him when they spoke at the party, not like everyone else does. Eren isn’t sure if they all know that he notices: how Krista hugs him without holding back, but looks him over afterwards as if to make sure she hasn’t broken him completely; how Jean and even Marco seem to rethink the things they say before the words are even said, and only directly at him; how even Mikasa avoids eye contact when she can help it. Even if everyone else doesn’t know what exactly is wrong with him, he knows they can tell that _something_ is, and Mikasa openly acknowledges that he’s broken without saying it at all.

The thing is, he _knows_ that he’s not alright, that it’ll take a long time to ever feel right, but the constant reminders keep the nightmares coming; Levi talks to Eren like he’s a whole person, like he’s just anybody else on the street, and it feels good.

He’d rather keep that feeling coming, and so when the morning comes to see Levi, and Mikasa mentions something about going grocery shopping, Eren finds the nerve to say, “Can I stay home?”

Mikasa halts what she’s doing and looks at Eren like he’s just done a backflip. “What?”

 

“If you’re going shopping,” Eren stabs at a peach slice with his fork. “Can I stay here?”

“Eren -”

“Don’t make me go to the _grocery_ store.” There’s a pleading in his voice that’s entirely too real. In truth, he hates grocery stores; being inside of them make him feel sick and lightheaded, surrounded by all the food he _hates_ that he needs. He’s memorised too many Nutrition Facts and calorie counts and seeing it all at once is just _too much_.

Something like understanding flickers across Mikasa’s face, but it’s battled by uncertainty. He gets why she doesn’t want to leave him alone - not after what happened the last time he was - but he’s ready to give a rapidfire argument about how great he’s doing, and how he handled the party incredibly well, considering, and all this great stuff, and he’s thinking about those scenarios in his head again, and -

“Okay.”

“Mikasa, I - wait, did you say okay?”

“Yeah,” she nods, the uncertainty in her expression melting a little. “Yeah, you’ll be fine.” She says the last bit more to herself then Eren, inhaling deeply through her nose. “It’s just for a couple hours, right? Not even.”

Eren tugs at his shirt collar. Just Mikasa leaving him alone is a miracle in itself but he pushes his luck anyway, “Would it be alright if I walked to Marco’s diner and stayed there for a bit? I mean, if it makes you feel any better, I wouldn’t be totally alone.” _That way, I have an alibi in case I’m not home when you get back._

Mikasa actually warms up incredibly quickly at the idea. “Yeah, yeah that’d be alright. Just be careful walking over there. And lock the door behind you.”

Mikasa hesitates on her way out the door, but in the end she gets in her truck and roars down the road without Eren in the passenger seat, and after he watches her disappear around the bend, he spends a few minutes soaking up the silence of the house. It’s the first time he’s been _truly_ alone since Before the Hospital and the solitude is nice for that little bit of time. It’s also the first time he doesn’t feel completely terrified to be left on his own.

Healing, he’s healing.

Before he ducks out of the house, Eren braves the mirror. He thinks about the things Pyxis told him during one of their sessions: “Whenever you look at yourself, find something positive and focus on that.” The usual circles under his eyes have lightened up and he looks less gaunt then he has in months. He supposes if there’s any positive it’s the return of colour to his face; he doesn’t look so _sick_ anymore. Eren wonders if there’s anything he should do with his hair before shaking his head and telling himself that’s it’s probably not even a real date. Probably. Maybe. _Oh, God._

Marco’s working at his usual post behind the cash register when Eren reaches the diner; he greets Eren with one of those broad smiles of his and a wave. Eren goes up to him and tries to return his smile evenly.

“Hey, Eren! Mikasa texted, saying you’d be stopping by, is there anything I can get for you?”

“Uh, no, thank you,” Eren rejects, fiddling with the cup of pens set next to the cash register. “Actually, I um,” he scratches at his face absentmindedly. It’s a dead giveaway, but Marco just keeps looking at Eren with that same, friendly, open expression. It kind of makes him feel guilty. “I was thinking about, uh, checking out the arcade. Next door. The arcade next door.”

“Oh!” Marco glances at the front window before looking back towards Eren. “Okay! Do you need change?”

Eren lets out a breath he hadn’t realised he’d been holding. _Is it really that easy?_ “I’m good.”

“Okay, have fun!”

Eren still doesn’t entirely believe on how incredibly easy it was to actually get to the arcade. In all of the scenarios he had run through in his head, none of them ended quite like this, and it’s, well, a _relief_. Even still, he takes a couple deep breaths before stepping inside.

The interior is bigger than he anticipated, with those classic arcade machines lining the walls and colorful, newer models scattered throughout the center. The carpet is a swirling pattern of blue and purple decorated with orange and green specks and the brightness of it makes Eren’s head ache a little. The lights are dimmed inside, at least, emphasising the rainbow of lights glittering off the machines. It’s not too busy, mostly just teenagers on their summer breaks hanging around and some little kids running around unattended. Eren steps out of the way of a girl tugging a younger boy along by the wrist.

Far in the back there’s neon signs hanging from the ceiling, one boasting about laser tag in jagged letters and another in pink, curly script that reads “Prizes.” Eren panics for a minute when he doesn’t see Levi right away. He hadn’t even thought about asking for a time and it’s still before noon, and he just can’t wait around here, he probably already looks stupid just standing there -

“This time, Hanji owes _me_ twenty bucks.”

Eren jumps probably _thirty_ feet into the air this time and when he meets Levi’s gaze he sees him smirking. Eren blushes furiously. “Are you going to make sneaking up on me a habit?”

Levi laughs and Eren almost thinks that it sounds like music before he realises how incredibly cheesy and dumb that sounds and stops the thought. _Get it together, Jaeger_.  Levi holds up a cup of generic gold coins and shakes it, the coins jingling loudly. “Gotta go check on that PacMan score.”

Eren follows Levi to the nearest PacMan machine; when it’s booted up and the pre-game screen is loaded, the High Scores are displayed and honestly Eren can’t say he’s surprised when he sees “L.A.” all the way down the line. “If I die before I get a perfect score on this stupid game, please consider my life a failure.”

Eren racks his brain for something witty to say but comes up empty-handed. Levi side eyes, but once the game starts, he’s hunched over the machine; Eren watches the pink ghost chase after that poor little yellow guy across the screen.

“Tell me more about Florida,” Levi says suddenly, gaze still laser focused on the screen. “I’ve never been out of this shithole town, I gotta live vicariously through your adventures.”

Eren stutters for a moment, unsure of what to say. He did go  to Disney World once, years ago, with his mom just for she died. He vaguely remembers crying in front of one of the rides because he wasn’t tall enough to go on. He tries to dredge up more memories from that trip, wincing when he comes up with his mother laughing. “It was hot,” Eren recalls. “And humid, like inhaling water. The beach was nice though. The water was warm.”

Levi hums to himself. “I went to the Pacific Ocean once, but fuck if I was getting into it.”

“Why not?”

Levi looks at Eren like he’s asked the stupid question in the world. “There are parasites and bacteria and dead things in the ocean. It’s the second most disgusting place on Earth.”

“What’s the first?”

“Hanji’s room.”

Eren chuckles. “It didn’t seem so bad.”

On screen, the level up music plays. “No, that was their parents house. They wanted to trash it because their parents are lowlife, scumbags,” Levi jostles the joystick on the machine halfheartedly. “Hanji and I live in this shitty, two bedroom rent house and Mr. and Mrs. Zoe are dumb enough to leave town for a few days.” Levi suddenly steps back from the machine. “I’m being rude.”

Eren watches as PacMan gets swallowed by the orange ghost. “I didn’t think you were being rude.”

“You’re too good to me,” Levi replies jokingly, but he touches the inside of Eren’s wrist as he says it. Eren’s heart does something funny.

 

It’s casual, at first; just meandering around the arcade and messing with the games and Levi saying witty things in which Eren laughs so hard he nearly cries. Eren actually manages to beat Levi at air hockey of all things, in which he’s rewarded with a hair ruffle and a , “I underestimated you, kid.” Eren even attempts the claw machine and much to probably everyone’s surprise actually manages to snag this odd looking, bear/bunny thing. It’s kind of hideous but he hands it to Levi anyway with another blush and a, “H-here.”

“You’re adorable,” Levi tells him, taking the stuffed animal and tucking it into the pocket of his leather jacket. “It’s very punk rock.”

Levi announces he’s starving and ends up getting these incredibly unhealthy, greasy-looking fries from the tiny food area they have cornered away; much to Eren’s relief, when he denies ordering anything, Levi just says, “Yeah, I don’t blame you, their food is shit.”

Levi pokes at his fries with a frown for a few minutes of silence before he says, “Your sister’s probably talked a lot of shit about me.”

Eren almost falls out of his chair. “Eh?”

 

Levi looks up at him. “That punk Levi, gets into fights, throws a lot of parties. One time I accidently broke this guy’s hand and he snitched like a little bitch, did she tell you about that?”

“How do you accidently break someones hand?” Eren wonders and it takes him a second to realise he said it outloud.

“He went to hit me and I ducked out of the way,” Levi waves a fry in the air as if to say it doesn’t matter. “But she did, right?”

Eren doesn’t say anything; it’s a dead giveaway. Levi’s eyes flash. “And yet here you are.”

 

Eren wonders if Levi’s like him: not all the way put together, or whole, and if he’s secretly terrified of people realising hat. He can’t imagine that Levi cares about _anyone_ thinks, let alone Eren himself; his opinion hardly matters, right? “Why wouldn’t I be?” Eren asks around the tightness in his throat.

Levi chuckles, but there’s something dark to it. “A lot of people are scared of me. Your sister’s one of them.”

“I’m not,” Eren insists, leaning closer without meaning to at all. “And she doesn’t know I’m here.”

Levi leans back in his own chair, crossing his arms and offering up another of those crooked smiles. “You little shit. Sneaking out to see me, huh.” He quirks an eyebrow. “That’s kind of romantic.”

Eren does the brave thing and grins.

~X~

In all honesty, Eren should have expected something to go wrong.

It starts with Levi pulling Eren towards one of those _Dance, Dance Revolution_ things, with the arrows flashing blue and pink. “Even a shit dancer like you can do Dance, Dance Revolution, right?” Levi asks with a smirk and half pushes Eren onto the center of one of the dance pads. “Don’t be a chickenshit, Eren.”

“I’ve never tried one of these things,” he confesses as Levi goes on to select a song from the (frankly horrid) list.

“Just follow the arrows,” Levi instructs, clicking his tongue against the roof of his mouth.

Eren feels awkward and clumsy and kind of dumb but Levi’s wearing this look of utmost concentration and Eren wonders if he takes everything he does so seriously. The song is chirpy and annoying, and the lights and flashy effects on screen hurt Eren’s head, but he thinks it’s worth it when the first song ends and Levi throws his hands in the air in triumph.

“One day I’m going to invent some kind of _Dance_ /Pacman crossover and it’ll be the best fucking thing the game industry has ever seen,” Levi proclaims. “I’m gonna get so fucking rich.”

Eren’s out of breath and grips the bar behind him for a moment. When his breath doesn't’ even out immediately, he panics, pressing a hand to his chest. Physical exertion is always incredibly hard on him because of his health; when he first got to the hospital, he fainted a few times from trying to work off the calories they were forcing down his throat, and it took him a lot of self-control to cut back on everything. It does even still, and he sits on the edge of the dance pad, struggling to get his breathing and heartbeat under control.He knows a large portion of it is the sheer panic and anxiety, because this can’t happen now, not in front of all these people, not in front of _Levi._

“Oi, Eren,” Levi crouches next to Eren, balancing on his knees. “You okay?”

“I’m fine,” Eren shakes his head. “Just out of breath.” He feels incredibly light-headed and puts his head between his knees, praying to every god that may be listening that he doesn’t pass out.  He shouldn’t, he’s been doing fine, and he ate this morning, _you’re just freaking yourself out, Jaeger, calm down._

“Are you dizzy,” Levi puts a hand on Eren’s shoulder, and there’s a genuine concern in his voice that makes Eren’s stomach do twists. “Maybe you should eat some-”

“No!” Eren reaches for the bar above his head and attempts to pull himself up. “I’m fine, I don’t need to eat.”

Levi stands, too, his mouth set in a thin line. “Let’s get you some fresh air.”

Eren is embarrassed and sick with himself when Levi leads him outside by the wrist, although the cool air is a relief. He’s mostly angry because there was no reason for any of that and his hands curl into fists when he think’s about it. “I’m sorry,” Eren starts to tell Levi but the later holds up a hand to stop him.

“Don’t be, that shit’s a real cardio workout.” Levi takes a cigarette out of the pocket of his leather jacket and Eren doesn't’ miss the way Levi angles away from him as he lights it. “Sorry I’m an asshole,” Levi apologises, waving his cigarette in the air. “You can’t breathe and I’m fucking smoking. I’d chew that nicotine gum shit but it tastes worse than ass.”

“It’s alright,” Eren reassures and digs his nails into his palms when he realises he still sounds out of breath.

“You sure you’re alright? I’m not being held accountable if you pass out.”

Eren replies with half a smile. He still feels a little sick, but that’s more out of his embarrassment than anything else. “Well it _was_ your idea.”

“Shit, better start running from the cops now.”

Eren laughs this time; it makes him feel a little better. He isn’t sure how long he’s been there with Levi - no more than a couple of hours at the most - and gets nervous when he thinks about Mikasa getting home. “I should probably get home before Mikasa does,” he tells Levi who nods at him.

“Want me to walk you like a good gentlemen?”

Yes. “That’s probably not a good idea. Y’know in case Mikasa comes back.”

“I can’t believe I’m letting you drag me into this Romeo and Juliet shit,” Levi shakes his head. “Call me again, yeah?”

Eren’s eyes go wide and he nods; was this a date after all? His fists uncurl as Levi drops his cigarette and steps on it with the heel of his shoe, before stepping closer to Eren. Eren’s mouth falls open when Levi reaches up and puts a hand on Eren’s cheek, and suddenly Eren can’t breathe all over again as Levi presses his mouth to corner of Eren’s.

“Don’t worry,” he says before pulling away. “I never kiss on the first date.”

And then he’s patting Eren’s cheek and sauntering off.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> #Don't Trust Erwin Smith 2k14
> 
> I KNOW THAT I DON'T REPLY TO COMMENTS AND I'M SO V TERRIBLY SORRY FOR THAT BUT THERE WAS A COMMENT LAST WEEK THAT MADE MY HEART DO THE THING AND I TEARED UP AND SO I'M GOING TO MAKE A VALIANT EFFORT TO START REPLYING OKAY AND IT'LL PROBABLY BE A LOT OF "aww thank you" BUT INSIDE I'LL BE GOING 'ageahiaoheaioeah!!!!!!!!?" so just a heads up my precious children
> 
> Shorter chapter I'm sorry?/// But Levi's POV next week so I'm redeeming myself I swear.
> 
> More triggers for anxiety/panic attacks why did I make Eren so sad

Eren can feel the tingle of Levi’s kiss all the way home. Well, kiss-not-kiss. Sort of kiss? Either way Levi’s lips were on _Eren_ and he’s still touching the corner of his mouth when he walks through the front door to find Mikasa standing in the kitchen, unpacking groceries. Even with the memory of Levi still faint on his mouth, the sight of all that food makes him uneasy.

 

“Hey,” Mikasa greets, pushing cereal into the pantry. “Marco texted, he was worried because you went to the arcade and didn’t come back.”

“Oh, I,” Eren drops his hand from his mouth like he’s been caught. “I didn’t feel good.” As soon as he finishes the sentence, he knows he shouldn’t have even started it, because Mikasa whips around so fast her own hair hits her in the face.

 

“Are you okay?” she takes a step closer, pressing the back of her hand to Eren’s forehead. “It’s almost time to eat again, sit down, I’ll make something. Do you feel sick?”

“Mikasa,” Eren groans, dragging out the last -a in her name. “I’m fine, just a little light headed.”

 

She doesn’t look entirely convinced and grabs his shoulders to push him down in the kitchen chair. “Just let me finish putting these away and I’ll make something.”

 

Eren presses his forehead against the table with a sigh and listens with his eyes closed to Mikasa moving about the kitchen. He thinks of Levi, his mouth tingling again. Levi had said to call him again and Eren spends so long turning over the question _But when_? in his mind that when he looks up he can feel the imprint of the wooden table embedded in his forehead. Mikasa, as oblivious as ever, is looking over Eren’s diet chart with two different boxes of pasta held in her hands. Eren watches her for a moment, thinking about what Levi said about Mikasa being scared of. Eren never imagined his sister being afraid of _anybody._

 

“Hey, Mikasa,” he starts, staring at the table top and picking off a splinter at the edge of it. “I was just y’know, wondering, and I -” he tears the splinter complete off. “I was just like, curious, as to why you don't trust Levi.”

 

Mikasa is silent over the stove. “You’re not thinking about seeing him again, are you?”

 

Eren breaks out into a sweat. After all, he didn’t like lying to Mikasa. “I was just curious.”

 

Mikasa sighs heavily. “He’s just not a good guy, Eren. I mean, when I say he gets into trouble a lot I don’t mean schoolyard trouble, I mean _jail_. A couple years ago, around the time mom -” she breaks off and then starts again. “A couple years ago, he and this guy, Smith, or someone, robbed this store. I think he got off on plausible deniability or 'I didn't know it was happening' or something.” She shrugs, her back still to Eren. “I just don’t like the idea of you hanging around a guy like that. He’s not good for you.” **  
**

Eren thinks, probably irresponsibly, that Mikasa shouldn’t make those kinds of decisions for him. She’s not - well, she’s not his _mom_. And yeah he appreciates her watching out for him, and he’s grateful for her help because without her he’d probably still be in _that_ place and everything, but there’s only so much he can take before he feels like he’s being suffocated. It’s why he “snuck” out to see Levi in the first place. Well, that, and it was Levi.

 

He recalls the conversation they had earlier today, in which Levi mentioned how people are scared of him, how despite that Eren was still there to see him. Eren doesn’t think Levi is scary at all. Some part of him keeps whispering that he doesn’t really know Levi, that he shouldn’t be forming these kinds of opinions about somebody he’s only spoken to a handful of times, but it’s driven out by the desire to _get to_ know Levi.

 

Because, despite everything that’s happened today, Levi still treats Eren like he’s normal.

 

~X~

 

When Eren has to go to his therapy appointment the next day, he gets there a little earlier so he can visit Armin, who is at his usual post at the center table in the cafeteria, scribbling furiously as a sketchpad. There’s orange paint dried on the side of his face and Eren wonders if it has anything to do with the art competition at the end of the month.

 

Armin greets him with another hug, his blue eyes wide. “How was your week?” he asks, setting his sketchpad to the side and propping his face in his hands, elbows on the table, to listen to Eren intently. “How did that party go?”

 

“Pretty okay, actually,” Eren starts, mirroring Armin’s position. “There’s this, ah, guy, Levi. He’s the one that invited me, and we kind of just. Hung out. And danced.” Eren blushes remembering it. “And then he invited me to this arcade, and I think it was a date because he kind of, sort of, maybe kissed me?”

 

Armin makes a faint gasping noise. “Like, how?”

 

“Well, like, the corner of my mouth,” Eren gestures vaguely. “Does that count?”

 

“ _I_ think so,” Armin decides with a nod. “So, are you gonna see him again?”

 

“I want to,” Eren admits. “But Mikasa doesn’t trust him.”

 

Armin rolls his eyes and Eren makes a noise of agreement.

 

Eren offers more information about his week and in return Armin tells him about the group therapy thing the hospital is trying, reminding Eren to ask his therapist about it during his visit today. “It’s really neat, actually,” Armin promises. “We mostly just talk about our emotions, of course, but sometimes we’ll talk about what’s just going on around here, which is nice, too. Oh, that reminds me, that art contest is in two weeks!” He flushes. “I thought maybe I’d do a painting for it. I already tried a few sketches and I didn’t like any of them.”

 

“I’m sure they were fine,” Eren replies, “But that sounds amazing. And I won’t forget, don’t worry, I’ll be there, Armin.”

 

~X~

 

Eren manages to make it through his meeting with Pyxis without anything too deep or philosophical to make his head hurt, and also remembering to ask about the group therapy Armin is so insistent on. Pyxis seems surprised by Eren’s question but tells him that he’ll outline it in Eren’s plan, or whatever. Eren goes to tell Armin the news before he remembers that he has an appointment with his physician and goes a little woozy.

 

He’d give anything to be able to skip it, but Mikasa wouldn’t put up with that for even a second. Eren likes his doctor just fine, although he’s a little loud and likes to remind Eren that he’s not eating enough or exercising too much and that if he’s not careful he’ll have to go back on those giant fucking iron pills that Eren’s always hated. Eren knows that’s just part of his job but doesn’t make him feel any better about himself

 

Dr. Hannes office is located in the clinic next door, so at least Eren only has to take a short trip to go see him. The usual nurse working greets Eren with a smile as he gives his name to her; she motions for him to go back right away. When Eren reaches Hannes door, he knocks on it twice. The doctor answers with his usual gusto and giant smile that Eren thinks always looked a little tired. “Eren! Come on it, my boy, it’s been a month. How’s being home?”

 

“It’s alright,” Eren answers, sitting in the hard backed chair in front of the desk. Hannes office is small, with just an examination table, the ever-present scale that Eren avoids looking at all costs, and a storage closet. There are other exam rooms further back, but Eren’s never needed to step foot in one. Hannes takes his seat behind the desk and flips open Eren’s file. “Ah, just a routine check-up today, but I am going to have to get some bloodwork,” he looks up at Eren apologetically. “You don’t have to stay for the results.”

 

“Okay,” Eren agrees, fingers digging into his knees and waiting for the inevitable words sure to follow.

 

Hannes looks over Eren’s file for a minute more, and then says, “Alright, let’s get you on that scale.

 

Eren feels sick before Hannes even finishes his sentence. He stalls as long as possible, drumming his fingertips against his knees before standing and letting Hannes guide him by his shoulder to Eren’s biggest enemy in the world. It’s one of those old-fashioned crickity ones, which makes it so much worse, because Eren has to _stand there_ and wait for Hannes to finish the balancing and -

 

“You’ve been doing great, Eren,” Hannes says with that ever-present, tired smile. “Getting healthier.” _Gaining weight_. Eren knows it’s a good thing, of course he does, but he bites the inside of his cheek hard enough to draw blood nonetheless.

 

Eren doesn’t believe in a cure for what he has. Getting it under control, maybe, but it’ll always be there, hovering around the edges of his awareness, reminding him again and again that he’ll never look in the mirror and like what he sees. He’s accepted that he’ll feel like this for the rest of his life, that no amount of mood stabilisers and no amount of iron pills and diets and _scheduled eating_ is ever going to take it away.

 

Eren knows better than to look at the final number as he steps off the scale and moves

to the examination table. “So, what have you been up to?” Hannes asks, scrubbing Eren’s forearm with an alcohol wipe.

 

Eren shrugs, trying not to wince too bad when Hannes pierces his skin with a ridiculously large needle. “Just, y’know, hanging out.”

“Hanging out’s good,” Hannes nods, eyes fixed on drawing Eren’s blood. “As long as you’re not holed up you’re in your room all day.”

 

Eren shrugs again.

 

“Alright, kiddo,” Hannes says after rubbing a generic band-aid onto Eren’s arm. “Just let me get some stats and you’ll be good to go.”

 

Eren thanks him, and although Hannes says there’s so need, Eren thinks there he is; he’s grateful for the quick visit, he’s grateful that he doesn’t have to stay for test results, because then he doesn’t need to stay there any longer in the same room with something that reminds him why he hates himself so much.

 

~X~

 

After picking Eren up, Mikasa drives them to Marco’s family’s diner to meet up with Jean, Ymir and Krista. Eren’s surprised to see Hanji and Levi there, bickering over a plate of fries that look slightly better than the ones from the arcade next door. “Oh, come on! It’ll be fun,” Eren hears Hanji say when he and Mikasa walk in; Mikasa does a double take and Eren watches her eyes narrow before going to sit next to Jean at their usual table. Eren hovers for a moment, staring at Hanji and Levi, and when Levi looks up and meets Eren’s gaze, there’s not an ounce of surprise in his face. Instead, he just gives his usual wink, leaving Eren to stumble towards his table, his heart skipping a beat.

 

Ever watchful Krista doesn’t miss it and as soon as Eren sits down, she’s leaning forward towards him and lowering her voice.”Did Levi just wink at you?”

 

“I don’t think so,” Eren lies, and Mikasa side-eyes him before glancing over at Levi. “I didn’t see anything.”

 

“He totally did!” Krista squeals, grabbing Eren’s hand. “Have you talked to him at all, y’know, since the party! Why don’t you go do that -”

 

“No,” Mikasa says too loudly and Krista frowns in her direction. Ymir arches an eyebrow, and Jean, who was in the middle of saying something to Mikasa, looks offended. Eren wants to disappear into a hole in the ground when he catches sight of Levi and Hanji staring openly at them.

 

“Calm down there, big sis,” Ymir snorts, but there’s something defensive in her tone that Eren thinks has to do with Krista. “Eren’s a big boy, he can take care of himself.” She crosses her arms. “Worried about protecting his virtue or something?”

 

“Am I missing something?” Jean asks, sounding truly lost.

 

“It’s nothing!” Eren insists, slamming his palms flat on the table. “Just forget about it, everybody.” Everyone at the table looks at him in pure shock; even Ymir’s eyes are wide, looking at Eren’s hands and then back at his face.

 

Mikasa’s jaw is set tight, and suddenly Eren’s more annoyed with her than he has ever been. It’s getting ridiculous, he thinks. He’s only had to hide from her once but that doesn’t mean he wants to keep doing it, and he’d call her out on her bullshit here if everyone wasn’t staring at him like -

 

Like he was crazy.

 

“You okay, bro?” Jean asks and suddenly Eren can’t breathe at all; he stands up so fast his head spins.

 

“Excuse me,” he blurts out and runs to the bathroom, battling the tightness in his chest and the wave of nausea rolling through him. He fucked up, _fuck_. He’s just so _angry_ and he stays bent over the sink in the bathroom for a moment, breathing into the porcelain and gripping the sides of it type. It’s so fucking stupid, all of it; slamming his hands on the table, Mikasa treating him like he’s completely incapable. He hates that - he already knows he’s broken and he needs her help, but the point at which she does it just makes him feel that much worse about himself. In the end, it’s mostly just because it _shouldn’t_ be this way. Eren should be able to choose who he can and can’t see, to take care of himself _period_.

 

All of a sudden, there’s a hand pressed into the small of his back, and a familiar voice asks, “Oi, Eren, you okay?”

 

 _Fuck._ Eren lifts his hand and gets his breathing under control; it’s the second time in two days Levi’s seen him like this, as _not okay_ and not normal and it brings back that feeling of wanting to disappear, tightening in Eren’s chest. “I’m fine,” he lies to Levi.

 

“Is your sister bitching about us?” Levi asks. His voice is low, but when Eren looks at him his expression remains neutral. The way he says _us_ makes Eren’s chest tighten further.

 

“I just,” Eren grips the edges of the sink, and the words swell in his throat before he can stop them. “I just want to be able to talk to you without her breathing down my neck.” Eren flushes when he finishes the sentence and avoids Levi’s eyes.

 

Levi hums to himself and Eren looks over to see him pull a pack of gum out of his pocket. When Levi catches him staring, he sighs, sticking a piece into his mouth. “I caved and got that stupid nicotine gum shit. Can’t smoke inside.” He crosses his arms and leans against the wall. “So, your sister. Doesn’t like me, right?”

 

“She doesn’t trust you,” Eren admits.

 

“She’s smart,” Levi concedes and Eren shoots him a look. “I wouldn’t trust me either.”

 

“I do,” Eren says and he almost looks away again, but when Levi meets his eyes there’s something soft in his.

 

“You’re an idiot,” Levi tells him. “But stupid or not, you can still think for yourself and it’s bullshit that she’s taking that away from you.” He clenches his jaw. “Does she know about yesterday?”

 

“Not yet.” Eren finally releases his old on the sink and stands up straight.

 

“Listen, kid,” Levi stands up too, stepping closer to Eren and lifting his hands to put them on Eren’s shoulders. “You want to keep hanging out, good. I want to see you, too, believe it or not, and don’t let your sister control you and what-not.” He bites his bottom lip and Eren watches the movement probably too obviously. “Hanji’s trying to drag me to this outdoor concert thing next weekend. I’d rather not be around a bunch of sweaty drunks listening to bad music, but I guess it wouldn’t be as much of a shitfest if you’re there being all adorable and shit. Come with us. I’ll pick you up, fuck what Mikasa says.”

 

“I - alright, yeah,” Eren agrees, still staring at Levi’s mouth and swallowing hard. “Okay.” Levi’s right, and Ymir was right too - Eren shouldn’t let Mikasa do that to him. He’s doing great, he’s eating; Hannes and Pyxis and everyone says he’s just fine. He handled the party, he handled everything, and he doesn’t need Mikasa to be two inches away from him at all time. He should be able to go out with Levi, and he decides right then that he’s going to.

  
“Good,” Levi squeezes his shoulders, and then in one swift move is stretching up and kissing Eren; it’s just a quick kiss, there and gone in the same second, but it wasn’t an almost-on-the-corner-of-the-mouth one and before Eren has time to recover, Levi is releasing him and leaving the bathroom. 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoa what an update already. Mainly because like?// I'm 98% sure my internet is getting shut off on the 26th and like??/ My mom said it'll only be off for a few days but my mom likes to make promises she doesn't keep so godspeed to that. Here's a send off I am sorry. I love you all. 
> 
> Agh trigger warnings for off-screen/past/implied drug use but not from our main babes. #DontTrustErwinSmith2k14
> 
> Levi has a motorcycle because Levi always has a motorcycle

Levi doesn’t really know when it all went wrong.

 

Maybe it started when he was a kid, with dead parents and a fucked up drunk for an uncle that’d rather have been bringing girls back to his place than actually feed the child the courts were stupid enough to grant him custody to. Maybe it started when that same uncle taught him how to use a knife in case anyone tried to hurt him, because growing up in a neighbourhood like that is bound to get you in trouble more than once.

 

Maybe it was when in high school, dating a man he thought he’d love forever and getting fucked over because that same man would rather be getting high and robbing convenience stores than loving him back.

 

Or maybe, he was just always meant to be this way.

 

~X~

 

“What is that kid doing to you?” Hanji laughs with a shake of their head, sipping at their soda and peering at Levi over the top of their glasses. It always makes him feel like a lab specimen, when they do that, and so he reaches over to flick Hanji between the eyes.

 

“I don’t even know what you’re talking about,” Levi answers, collapsing into the chair across from Hanji. At this point, Mikasa had already more or less dragged Eren out of the diner by his shirt collar, her friends following after with conflicting looks on  their faces. Poor kids, getting caught up in this shit. Levi almost feels sorry for them.

 

Hanji pushes their glasses up onto their head - smart move, really - and looks at Levi with both eyebrows raised. “Y’know, that Jaeger guy, with the pretty turquoise - no, teal, no -” Hanji frowns. “Whatever colour they are, they’re _pretty_ eyes. He’s pretty, is that why you like him so much?”

Levi rests his elbows on the table and pushes his fingers into his eyes. “Shut up, Hanji.”

 

“I’m serious!” Hanji shrieks in reply, leaning back in their chair and crossing their arms. “The poor little thing has a panic attack and you rush in to help him. That’s not the Levi I know. He’s changing you now, oh I can’t wait to see what he’ll really do to you!” Hanji’s eyes flash and Levi glares at them. “He’ll be the death of you, Levi.”

 

Levi wants to kick Hanji under the table and give some great big dramatic speech on how wrong they are, how Eren Jaeger is just another pretty face with a good story that Levi can get out of his system and move on. How the moment Levi saw him he knew he wasn’t like every other boring, clearcut sob story that stumbled across his path; because they always do, it seems. The broken things always seem to find him and but he’s not about fixing people, he’s about making them into art. Like a mosaic. Which is stupid and downright _pathetic_ but Eren Jaeger seems like the he could be beautiful if he picked himself up and worked for it. Eren isn’t a project to be abandoned.

 

But that speech wouldn’t end the way it’d begin and so Levi doesn’t say anything at all.

 

“So,” Hanji pushes on and Levi feels like he’s two seconds away from strangling them. “Did you invite the cutie to the musical festival?”

 

“Yeah,” Levi gives them, opening his eyes to look at Hanji. “He said yes.”

 

“Well, of course he did,” Hanji shrugs and picks up a fry, long gone cold, to inspect it. “He’s sneaking out to go on dates with you, it’s very Romeo and Juliet. Teenagers love that shit. Ooh, is that why you’re so into him? The whole forbidden romance thing?” Hanji drops their fry and leans closer to Levi, their glasses falling from off the top of their head onto the bridge of their nose.

 

“There doesn’t have to be some complicated fucking reason why,” Levi tells them, standing up. “Believe it or not I’m actually capable of liking someone just for, y’know, being them, or whatever.” He waves a hand. “Are you ready to go, I have work in literally two hours.”

 

Hanji scoops up a handful of fries and stuffs them into their mouth before standing. They try to say something but it comes out as little more than a mumble. “ I don’t know what the fuck you’re saying and you’re disgusting,” Levi tells them.

 

Hanji swallows and follows Levi towards the entrance. “I _said_ I’m gonna figure out what’s got you so hooked on this Eren kid.”

“Share with the class when you do,” Levi fires back and it startles him when he realises he’s only half-joking.

 

~X~

 

There’s a lot of things Levi hates - dirt, people who don’t clear the food of their plate before putting it in the sink, wet food, and also bees - but one of the things he hates the most is his stupid job. He had it coming to him, he thinks, pushing the stupid visor onto his head. This is what happens when you’re dropout with a GED and no intentions of touching college with a ten foot pole. You get stuck working in the greasy, _disgusting_ place that is Taco Bell. On the outskirts of the equally greasy city that he also hates. At least he has less of a chance to run into anyone he knows there. Hanji would call that the silver lining.

 

Hanji may be the only person in the entire world Levi would dare call his best friend, but that doesn’t make them any less annoying. Hanji has a terrible habit of producing gross, lab experiments that always end up growing mold and fungus and making him sick, so when he opens the bathroom to find some kind of sick goo crawling out of the sink, the first thing he does is call their name.

 

“What the fuck is this,” Levi points to the sink when Hanji pokes their head around the corner.

 

“Oh, I’m testing the -”

 

“No, I don’t care,” Levi crosses his arms. “Just clean it up.”

 

“But you’ll tamper with the results!” Hanji cries like it’s the worst thing Levi’s ever done. “Come on, he’s not hurting anyone.”

 

“He,” Levi repeats, but just shakes his head and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Hanji, it’s near my toothbrush. I put that in my mouth and I’d rather not have - whatever _that_ is all over it. Please just move it out of the bathroom. Fuck, keep it in the kitchen.” He pulls a face.”No, fuck, we eat in there. Keep it in your bedroom.”

 

“Le- _vi_ ,” Hanji whines, stretching out the vowels of his name. “Come on, you’ve had worse things in your mouth.”

 

“That is the most horrible thing you’ve ever said to me, don’t talk to me for a week.”

 

Hanji frowns in an exaggerated manner and just shuts the door behind Levi when he leaves the bathroom, instead of cleaning up that _monstrosity_ like he asked them to. “Do you wanna drive me or can I borrow your car,” Levi deadpans, already holding his hands out for the keys he knows Hanji will hand to him.

 

Hanji just shakes their head and picks up a pair of jeans they’ve left in the hallway, rifling through the pockets before producing the set of keys with too many decorations on them. “When are you gonna get Sonny fixed?” they ask, tossing Levi the keys.

 

Levi catches them midair. “Please don’t call my motorcycle Sonny.”

 

Hanji puts a hand on one of their hips. “Stop procrastinating, take him tomorrow. That local place in town.”

 

“I beat up the kid that works there,” Levi reminds Hanji, who just rolls their eyes. “He might pull a dick move and sabotage it.”

 

“Good, maybe it’ll teach you not to get into fights.”

 

“You’re a bitch.”

“Love you, too.”

 

To tell the truth, another thing Levi hates is Hanji’s car. It’s some kind of ugly ass station wagon that makes clanking noises, with a radio stuck on the local Top 40 station that makes Levi want to tear his eyes out of his skull. It sucks up gas more than even his bike does, and if Levi and Hanji weren't two broke kids sharing a 5 room house they probably would have pooled together to get a new one long ago. The gasket on his bike blew out last week, and that’s actually something he can afford to get fixed, but he doesn’t feel like dealing with the brat at the garage. He can’t afford to take it into the city.

 

He wonders idly if he could get Eren to talk that Jean kid into not totally fucking up his vehicle. No, that’s stupid, he shouldn’t ask Eren that. He’d probably do it. Fuck. Levi hates himself.

 

He decides firmly not to think about Eren at all and he actually manages it until he’s walking into work to find Isabel leaning over the counter, her own purple uniform shirt untucked despite regulation, and her hat facing backwards on her head. She’s moaning to Farlan about having to work a double shift, and he just crosses his arms and looks down at her with a raised eyebrow.

 

“You know some people would kill for a job,” Levi says to announce his presence and Isabel straightens up with a smile.

 

“Big brother!” she greets, still smiling. “I thought I heard Hanji’s creaky car.”

 

Levi hums and as he walks past her, he fixes her hat so the visor is facing forward. She touches her hair and sticks her tongue out at him and he contemplates doing it back before remembering that he’s not a five year old. Levi heads towards the back to clock in, hearing his co-workers follow him; Isabel in bouncing steps and Farlan in long strides. “Sooo,” Isabel starts and Levi knows what she’s gonna ask before she even says it. “How’s _Eren_?”

 

Levi stares at the time table pinned to the wall in the back room. Isabel’s been bugging him about Eren ever since Levi made the fatal mistake of inviting him to that party in front of her. Jesus Christ, and then after the actual party. Isabel’s one of the few people that Levi allows to tease him, but that doesn’t make it any less irritating, especially when he’s doing so well in not thinking about fifteen year old kids with eyes that look like they contain a fucking galaxy in them.

 

“You never told me how the date went,” Isabel pouts, trailing Levi as he makes his way to the front cash register. There’s already a line forming and Levi resists the urge to turn around and hide in the back. Fuck, he’d rather be working the drive-thru line and that’s saying something.  Speaking of, that’s exactly where Isabel should be, not grilling him about Eren.

“Get to work,” he tells her with a sigh. “Maybe if you do good I’ll tell you.”

 

Isabel’s smile grows and she claps Levi on the shoulder before downright skipping to take her station at the order window. He watches after her with another sigh. He’s known Isabel since she was a toddler wandering around that same fucked up neighbourhood that Levi learned to fend for himself in, and he made the great decision to watch after her until she learned on her own. Of course, even after, Isabel stuck to his leg like glue, calling him brother and never quite leaving his side; Farlan, too, for that matter. Levi got them their jobs in the first place, convincing the manager to hire these two punk kids despite their outrageous manners and he’d just really appreciate if they showed some courtesy and took the job seriously. A job is a job, fast food or not.

 

Levi shakes his head and turns back to do his own job, glad for the distraction from boys with pretty eyes.

 

~X~

 

It’s not like there hasn’t been anyone between _the guy_ that fucked Levi over and Eren. There’s been a few drifters, here and there, that he’s kept around for a little while, that he’s helped along even though he can’t even help himself. They don’t ever seem to last very long and in the end, Levi barely even misses them. He always remembers their names, always remembers the first words they said to each other and the last. But he doesn’t think about them, probably not as much as he should for someone who invested himself emotionally, but he’s got better things to do then dwell on bleeding hearts.

 

Hanji’s one of the ones that stayed - the little, agender, shitty glasses-wearing best friend that swooped in like some kind of psychotic bird and perched on his shoulder and anchored themselves to him. Give or take several years and here he is, staring at Hanji as they go on about taking _Sonny_ to the shop in town.

 

“He can make the trip there, stop moping,” they wiggle their fingers at Levi before pushing their glasses further up their nose. “Just get it over with before you blow your money one of those poker games.”

 

“Wow, I can’t believe you think so little of me,” Levi replies with mock offense, standing up from the couch.  He’s pretty sure some dirt comes with him and he holds down a gag; he’ll have to vacuum soon. Again. “If I do, will you leave me the fuck alone.”

 

“I’ll even pay for a quarter of the repair costs,” Hanji announces with a brilliant grin and Levi just really, _really_ wants to strangle them.

 

In the end, he caves and coaxes his motorcycle into making it to the shop across town. It’s old as fuck, but it’s managed to cling to life this long and he’ll juice as much life out of it as he can. He bought the damn thing when he was sixteen, from a shady guy on a street corner with nicotine-stained fingers and missing teeth, and Lord knows it’s probably stolen but no cops have been banging down his door yet and the guy at the DMV Levi paid off hasn’t coughed up, so there’s that.

 

The poor bike nearly gives out before Levi even manages to get it to that makeshift garage in the part of town that’s more woods than actual buildings; that Jean brat is there, wearing grease-covered overalls and frowning into the hood of a nicer car than Levi expected to see in a place like this. Levi hates auto shops; they're greasy and dirty and reek of oil that stays in your sinuses for at least a week and that’s probably one of the main reasons he’s been avoiding showing up at this place.

 

When Levi pulls up, Jean glances at him, immediately furrowing his brow and looking thoroughly angry. Levi pulls his helmet off and glares at him, “I don’t want to fight, just fix my damn motorcycle.”

 

Jean bares his teeth. “Why should I?”

 

“Um, because it’s your job and I have cash, maybe. Just a suggestion.” Levi offers up his very best smirk and is rewarded with Jean making an exaggerated noise of complaint before gesturing towards Levi’s bike.

 

“What’d you to it, punch it in the face?” he asks with venom in his voice and Levi rolls his eyes.

 

“No, asshole, the gasket’s blown.” Levi looks down at his bike with a curl to his lip. “Just fix the fucking thing so I can get out of here. I don’t care how much it costs.”

 

Jean doesn’t look too happy about having to help Levi with _anything_ but steps towards the motorcycle when Levi climbs off. “I’ll have to assess the damage,” Jean says in that voice people get when they’re talking about something they know a lot about. “Could run a thousand if you really fucked it up.”

 

Levi grits his teeth. “That’s fine.” It’s really not, but he could always borrow the money from Hanji and pay them off later. Maybe. “How long will it take?” Because money may not be a huge problem at the moment but having to stand there in that sweaty garage with some kid who has it out for him.

 

Jean crouches next to the bike. “Again, it depends on the damage. Couple hours at least.”

“Fucking perfect,” Levi says, shedding his jacket and dragging a nearby abandoned fold-over chair towards him, straddling it and crossing his arms onto the back of it. He drags a hand over his face, exhaling loudly. It’s going to be a long day.

 

As Levi watches Jean work he realises that he actually doesn’t know that much about him. Just that he likes to start shit just to impress people and works here; and that he’s friends with Eren. Or, at the very least Mikasa. Levi bites his tongue, telling himself not to mention Eren at all. Keep Eren out of this conversation 100%.

 

Twenty minutes later and it’s Jean who brings the damn kid up, “Are you and Eren hooking up?” It comes out of nowhere, no lead-up or anything and Levi stares at Jean. There’s a smear of black across his forehead. He looks like an idiot.

 

“I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” Levi snipes.

 

Jean’s face goes red and Levi rests his head in one of his hands. “I was just wondering,” Jean mumbles. “But you are, right? Marco - my boyfriend said he saw you guys at the arcade. I mean I don’t care, but I know a certain older sister who wouldn’t be too thrilled.”

 

Levi narrows his eyes, “Are you blackmailing me?”

 

“No,” Jean snorts, looking away. “I don’t want anything from you.”

 

“What, do you think I’ll offer to pay you to keep mine and Eren’s dirty little secret on the downlow, so you can turn around and tell Mikasa that ‘Oh,’” Levi dramatically highers the pitch of his voice. “‘Levi paid me hundred bucks to keep my mouth shut’.”

 

Jean doesn’t bother stopping what he’s doing. “So, you’re not gonna deny it?”

 

“I may be a lot of things but I’m not a liar,” Levi stands up from his chair, and Jean does too, like he’s itching for a fight or maybe just plain expecting Levi to hit him again. Levi wants to, God, he wants to, but instead he just curls his fingers into his palm and exhales, thinking of Eren and his stupidly pretty eyes. “I don’t care if you fuck shit up for me,” he growls, poking Jean hard in the chest. “But don’t you _dare_ fuck things up for Eren just because you have some sort of agenda against me.”

 

“You’ve got it bad,” Jean smirks and Levi needs to step back to keep himself from really punching Jean in the face.

 

“Yeah, well, kid’s pretty fucking special, huh?” Levi says and his voice drips with what probably sounds like bitterness but feels like something else entirely. “I’ll just wait in your shitty shop until you feel like you wanna stop being a dick.”

 

Levi pushes a piece of nicotine gum into his mouth with irritation and disappears into the tiny waiting room containing a waist-high desk cluttered with papers and an outdated computer set atop it; the floor is checkered in black and white and the pattern gives Levi a headache. He sinks into another one of those grey, metal chairs and leans forward, resting his elbows on his knees and pushing the heels of his hands against his eyes until they burn. He probably just fucked up big time, knowing that dumbass horseface and his big mouth.

 

It pisses Levi off more than anything, Mikasa’s control over Eren. He doesn’t know if it’s more to do with his own lack of respect for any sort of authority or more the fact that she’s the reason Levi can’t contact Eren more. Both reasons are fucking _bullshit_ and Levi’s disgusted with himself. Eren’s supposed to be another one of those mosaics that Levi patches up and sends on their merry way, not - this. Not the constant thinking about and the sweaty palms and the faster breathing. Fuck, he straight up has a crush on this kid. This dumb, awkward kid who doesn’t get enough to eat and blushes every time Levi looks at him, with those eyes large and round and fuck, what colour are they anyway?

 

Levi certainly never planned on sitting in the autoshop of a guy he recently punched in the face, thinking about how a fifteen-year-old boy drives him fucking crazy.

 

~X~

 

When Levi gets home - at sunset, with $800 less in his bank account, and the snide looks of Jean Kirschtein hanging over his shoulder - he finds Hanji babbling into the house phone at the speed of light, bouncing around the kitchen and talking about the synthesis of water.

 

“Who’s on the phone?” Levi asks, tossing his keys onto the kitchen counter. There’s not many people willing to listen to Hanji’s crazy, crackpot chemistry theories. Actually, now that he thinks about it there’s literally nobody.

 

Hanji breaks off mid-sentence and flashes Levi a smile that looks too mischievous to be of any good. “Hey, Eren, guess who just got home?”

 

“Give me the fucking phone, Hanji.”

 

Hanji tries to duck their way out of the kitchen but Levi sticks a foot out to trip them, sending them sprawling with a yelp; he manages to catch the phone before they make it all the way down. “Yo.”

 

Eren’s practically giggling on the other end of the phone and it does something funny to Levi’s chest. Jesus Christ, Hanji’s right. Eren will be death of him. “Is Hanji alright?”

 

“Don’t worry about them,” Levi says, lightly kicking one of Hanji’s shins. “How long did they drone on to you about their headache-inducing chemistry shit?”

 

Levi can hear the smile in Eren’s voice. “About an hour or so.”

“I am so sorry I let that happen to you,” Levi sighs, kicking Hanji’s shin a little harder. Hanji finally gets up, straightening their glasses on their face and doing some weird twitching thing that Levi thinks is supposed to be a wink.  

 

“It’s okay, they told me how you were out getting your motorcycle fixed.” Eren pauses. “Do you really have a motorcycle?”

 

“What, do you have a kink?” Levi teases; Hanji’s eyes go wide and when they lean forward as if to listen, Levi puts a palm on their face and pushes them away.

 

“W-what?” Eren squeaks and it’s adorable. “N-no, I was just -”

 

“Admit it,” Levi says and although Eren can’t see him smirk he does it anyway. “You just have a thing for tough guys with leather jackets and motorcycles.” Hanji mouths something at Levi and that’s when he’s decided he’s had enough and starts walking towards the hall; they start to follow him until he gives them a sharp glare.

  
Eren’s quiet for a moment, and then says, like he had to work up the nerve to say it, “Mostly I just have a thing for you.”


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lots of important things happen this chapter. Also what whoa there's actually conflict who would have guessed?? 
> 
> aLSo i remade my blog because anxiety reasons so if you're looking for me you'll find me over at roguearmin.tumblr <333
> 
> More triggers for off-screen drug abuse #donttrusterwinsmith2k14  
> please make that a tag thank u

Erwin Smith.

 

Six feet and two inches of bad jokes and fake smiles. Levi met him when he was still trying his hand at high school, at a shitty party for an equally shitty friend. Erwin walked in like he owned the place, flashed a brilliant white smile and looked at Levi like maybe he wasn’t completely worthless and it was all over for him. Levi hates him more than he’s ever hated anyone.

 

Because he built up this great thing, made art of out of the two of them, and then turned around and decided that fucking _heroin_ was more more worth his time. Levi remembers getting phone calls at three am, of a slurring Erwin asking him to borrow money, _just a little bit, Levi, I’ll pay you back, I promise, I love you._ Of course he always gave it to Erwin. Because despite it all, Levi had already made the mistake of loving him, too.

 

When Levi walked into the bathroom to find him passed out and seizing on the tile floor with a used needle in his open palm, he decided that he had had enough. Walking out of that hospital, leaving Erwin crying and begging behind him, was the best damn thing he ever did.

 

So you could say he’s less than thrilled when two years later he’s standing in his kitchen, hearing Erwin breathe his name on the other end of the phone.

 

“How did you get this number?” Levi asks, voice low and he has to lean against the wall to stay upright.

 

“Mutual friends,” Erwin answers vaguely after a second of hesitation. Levi makes a note to get some new friends.

 

“Why are you calling me?”

 

Erwin sighs heavily on the other line; Levi is more familiar with the sound than he’d like to be. “I just wanted to see how you were.”  He sounds good, Levi realises. Not like the last time Levi saw him. That pisses him off.

 

“Since when do you fucking care,” Levi sneers, his grip on the phone tightening. Maybe if he tries hard enough he can pretend it’s Erwin’s neck.

 

Levi’s expecting Erwin to spout that same bullshit he always did, about how he’s never not cared, how he’s just oh so very sorry. Levi wants Erwin to be angry at him for leaving, he wants Erwin to hate him as much as Levi does him. It’d be so much easier that way, instead of listening to this bullshit. “I’m clean,” Erwin says instead, and Levi wants to do the poetic thing and say, _You may be clean but you’re still toxic._ “I went through a twelve step program-”

 

“Two years,” Levi interrupts between gritted teeth. “Clean or not, you can’t just call me up out of the fucking blue and expect me to just -”

“I’m not expecting anything,” Erwin defends and Levi thinks it’s the biggest lie he’s ever told. “I just want to see you.”

 

Levi’s blood goes cold. It’s been two years, two years of not having to hold his breath every time the phone rang thinking _today’s going to be the day he dies_ ; two years of breathing right again and this asshole thinks he can just come in and fuck it all up. Levi won’t let him, not again. “Why?”

 

Erwin goes quiet and for a moment, Levi thinks he hung up, the bastard, but then he whispers, “Because I need to fix what I did to you.”

 

“Are you using me as some part of retribution? One of those, go back and apologise to everyone you’ve ever hurt sort of things?” Levi snorts. “I bet that list is long.”

 

“Please -” Erwin begins but Levi has heard that word come out of his mouth far too many times before and it makes him angry all over again. Suddenly, he’s downright _furious_ , because how _dare_ Erwin call him when he's doing just fine? Maybe not all the way put together, not all the way right, but he's functioning, and damn it, he's damn near _content_. He’s not going to let this fucker dupe into letting him back in, let him crawl back into the hole he left and tear Levi from the inside out.

 

So that’s why he yells, “Fuck you, Erwin. Fuck you and your fucking _redemption_ and don’t even think about calling me again. I walked away from you for a good reason and you changing or saving yourself or whatever is you’re fucking doing isn’t going to change that.”

He hangs up before Erwin can reply, hands shaking and he doesn’t want to be crying, and he hates himself for crying but he’s just so fucking _pissed off_ because now Erwin’s going to be hovering on the edges of his thoughts for the next God knows how long. Because now he’ll be remembering everything, the good and the bad, and how Erwin is the entire reason Levi sees those lost, broken pieces inside of people and tries to make them whole again. It’s fucked up, Erwin fucked him up.

 

When the phone rings in his hand again he answers it with a roar of, “What do you want from me?!”

 

“I- I’m sorry, I -”

 

Oh, God, fuck. Fuck, it’s Eren. Levi fucked up. Jesus.

 

“No, fuck, it’s - I thought you were someone else,” Levi says weakly, his voice cracking. “Are you okay?”

 

“Are you?”

 

Levi thinks Eren is more observant than he’s given him credit for. In all honesty, Eren’s the last person Levi needs to be talking to right now; if he should be calling anybody, it’s Hanji, but Eren’s concern is oddly reassuring. Jesus fuck, Levi’s an idiot. “Yeah, just,” Levi pinches the bridge of his nose. “People are fucking assholes.”

 

“I know,” Eren agrees. There’s a wavering in his voice that makes Levi uneasy.

 

“Did something happen?” he asks and Eren clears his throat.

 

“I - uh, it’s just - Mikasa,” Eren says her name with a twist to it. “Just a stupid fight.”

 

“About me?” Levi asks and it’s fucked up that he’s practically _giddy_ at the thought. Maybe he gets some sick satisfaction out of knowing that he’s at least managed to piss one person off.

 

Eren just snorts and it’s all the confirmation that Levi needs. “I made her so mad that she actually left the house,” Eren says and there’s an underlying anger in his voice that Levi understands.

 

“What’d you tell her?”

Eren pauses. “I told her she was just upset because -” his voice thickens.  “Because I don’t need her to take care of me anymore.”

“Ooh,” Levi hisses. “Below the belt.”

“Yeah, well,” Eren says with heat in his tone but he cuts himself off before he can really get into it. Levi tilts his head back and stares at the ceiling. The tension in his shoulders has eased slightly, just by hearing this kid’s fucking voice and God, fuck, he’s a hopeless romantic, after all.

 

On a whim, Levi says, “Come over here for a bit. I’ll pick you up.” It’s a bad idea, it’s a terrible idea, but it’s an idea he’s going to go through with none the less. He’s using Eren as a distraction and he knows it, but God, he needs that right now. In a skewed way, he needs Eren.

 

“I - yeah, yeah okay.”

 

Maybe it’s because Eren is everything Erwin never was.

  
~X~

 

Against his better judgement, Eren leaves a note for Mikasa telling her where he’ll be. After all, he thinks bitterly, probably in defense to himself, she’s the one that walked out. He had won the big blowout that had been their argument after all, right? _Do what you want_ , Eren, she had said for once.

 

He doesn’t know where she went or how long she’ll be gone but at this point he’s not sure he cares. Eren’s hands are still shaking with anger, at what she’s said, at her constant reminder that he’s fucked up; he’s over it. At this point, he’s just been plain _tired._ And it’s because he’s upset that he calls Levi.

 

He shouldn’t, he knows, he shouldn’t put all that on somebody he’s just getting to know, but Levi’s the only person he can think of. Armin, of course, but Eren can’t call Armin, and Eren doesn’t think it’s all that great of an idea to get Mikasa’s friends involved in this at all.

 

Levi sounded upset, too, when he answered the phone but he recovered far quicker than Eren’s ever seen anyone do. He finds that Levi sounding upset isn’t something he likes to hear; he resolves to ask him about it later, if Levi feels like sharing. Eren wouldn’t push, he knows what it’s like when someone tries to get you to talk about feelings you don’t want to mention.

 

When Levi mentioned coming over, Eren jumped on the chance. Because he wants to see Levi. Or maybe, mostly because he knows it’ll make Mikasa as angry as he is.

 

Eren waits outside for Levi, who shows up faster than Eren’s expecting him too, on a sleek motorcycle that makes a dangerous-sounding rumbling noise. It’s impressive, Eren thinks. Levi kills the engine once he’s in the driveway, leaning to the left with one foot planted on the ground while he takes his helmet off. He raises an eyebrow at Eren, standing there awkwardly with his hands in his pockets. “You doing okay?”

 

Eren shrugs. “I just, ah,” he clears his throat. “I don’t wanna be here.”

 

Levi gives a half-smile. “I can fix that.” He holds his helmet out; Eren takes it and it’s heavier than he’s expecting. “Gotta wear the helmet, though.”

 

Eren blinks at Levi for a second before situating the the padded helmet over his head; the visor is tinted dark and Eren wonders how Levi can even see the road through it. “How do I look?”

 

Eren catches a glimpse of a full blown smile. “Uncomfortable. Come on,” Levi starts the engine up again. “You ever been on one of these?”

 

Eren tries to shake his head but the helmet is clunky against his skull and he puts a hand on it to steady himself. “No,” he admits out loud instead.

 

Levi clicks his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “Adorable. Alright, come here. Just throw a leg over - Wait,” Levi says suddenly, letting go of the handles and shedding his leather jacket. “Put this on first.”

 

Eren looks at Levi before realising he can't see him through the tint of the visor and takes the jacket; the faint scent of cigarette smoke clings to the inside fabric and Eren finds it’s not entirely bad. The jacket comes up a little short on his torso but it’s not too tight. When he glances at Levi, now only wearing the thin cotton of a t-shirt that makes Eren feel guilty, he notices a tattoo of an intricately done compass on his right forearm, the north needle a long point stretching towards his hand and stopping just at his palm. Eren wonders if he has any others.

 

“Better,” Levi nods at him. “Okay, come here -” he holds his left hand out for Eren. “Throw a leg over and hold on tight.”

“Will you be okay without the jacket?” Eren asks with concern, stopping short after climbing onto the bike when he realises he has to lock his arms around Levi’s waist.

 

“Don’t worry about me, kid,” Levi tells him, guiding Eren’s arms when he notices his hesitation. “I’ve ridden this thing wearing a lot less.”

 

Eren’s suddenly very, very hot inside the jacket and helmet and it’s probably the first time he hasn’t been outright cold in over a year. It’s startling, to say the least, and he’s still hesitating until Levi kicks the motorcycle into full throttle; the lurch makes Eren yelp and cling to Levi tighter. He’s pretty sure he even hears Levi chuckle.

 

The velocity and wind isn’t at all what Eren is expecting once they get on the road. Even thru the jacket and helmet, it’s loud and harsh and Eren wonders how Levi is faring at all just wearing a t-shirt. Eren’s stomach jumps into his chest more than once and for a few minute he’s scared he’s going to throw up before the feeling passes, although the rattling of his heart against his ribcage does not. Eren’s heard stories of how riding a motorcycle is a pure adrenaline rush and as he grips Levi’s t-shirt in his fingers he thinks he understands. He keeps his eyes shut for the majority of the ride but when he opens them he sees blurred colours flying by at a speed that makes him nauseous all over again.

 

The ride isn’t long at all and Eren thinks Levi and Hanji’s place is closer than he initially thought. When Levi kills the engine again it comes as a surprise and it takes Eren a feel more seconds to peel himself off, leaning back with a gasp and near ripping the helmet off his helmet to breathe.

 

“You alright back there?” Levi asks glancing over his shoulder and Eren has to swallow  a few times before he can answer.

 

“Yeah,” he gasps. “That was - intense.”

 

Levi snorts. “That was nothing. I’ll take you on a real ride one day.”

 

Eren tries to attribute his wheezing to the ride as Levi gestures for him to climb off; he does in a scramble, handing Levi his helmet back when he follows suit, before looking over the house Levi’s brought him too. It’s small and low to the ground, the lawn and windows _immaculately_ clean. Even the concrete driveway is pristine, without weeds growing along the edges or anything, a beat-up looking station wagon parked next to Levi’s motorcycle. The house itself is a muted blue colour that’s easy on the eyes, although the door is harsh yellow colour that Eren cringes at.

 

“Home sweet home, and all that,” Levi says with crinkle to his nose, before lightly taking hold of Eren’s wrist and guiding him towards the front door, a set of keys already in his hands. There’s a green and black lanyard on the keyring, as well as metal decoration that looks like a pair of wings overlapping each other. They jingle as Levi unlocks the ugly yellow door, pushing it open and releasing Eren’s wrist as he steps inside.

 

The interior is just as clean as the outside, if not more so, with freshly vacuumed carpets and not a speck of dust on any of the mismatching furniture. The entrance opens in a living room with a single, dark couch against the left wall. Eren spots the stuffed animal that he won out of the claw machine at the arcade sitting in the middle of it and his ears burn. There’s a low coffee table in front of the couch with a neat stack of coasters on one edge, and beyond that a rickety entertainment stand with a rather small tv inside of it. Beyond that the room morphs into a kitchen, the carpet turning to tile, and Levi walks between the entertainment stand and the coffee table to reach it, Eren following him.  

 

Levi tosses his keys onto the kitchen counter and the sound echoes off the tile. “You hungry or anything? We have shit food, Hanji used all the good stuff for their shitty experiments.”  
  
“Ah, no,” Eren denies, per usual. He stresses over the fact that one day Levi will notice the pattern. There’s a small kitchen table with just two chairs next to it by the fridge and Eren chooses the nearest seat. “Where is Hanji anyway?” It occurs to Eren that they’re alone and he gets hot all over again; he takes the jacket off this time but lays it across his lap, hands bunched into the fabric.

 

“They go to the community college in the city,” Levi says, squinting into the sink like he’s checking for specks. “Are you uncomfortable?” he meets Eren’s eyes and Eren’s very glad he took the jacket off.

 

“No.”

 

“That’s good,” Levi nods, taking the empty chair across from Erens and folding his hands on the table top. “So you wanna talk about what happened?”

Eren is surprised by the question. “With - with Mikasa, or  . . . ?”

 

“If you want.”

 

Eren bites his lower lip hard. He’d much rather not think about Mikasa right now, but the more he considers venting, the better he’s starting to believe he’d feel. After all, Levi’s the one that brought it up, so he has to care at least a little bit, right? Eren grips the jacket in his hands tighter, winding a hand through one of the sleeves. He’s not sure how much he wants Levi to know. Certainly not about his diagnosis, and that’s the entire foundation of why he and Mikasa were fighting in the first place. That, and Levi himself.

 

“I-” Eren opens his mouth to say, and the feelings surge to his throat. “She’s just really protective and I mean, I understand but sometimes it’d be nice if she just laid off. She just likes to remind me that I’m - I’m not -” he swallows hard, cutting himself off. _Not normal. Broken_. “That I’m just - not all the way -” he exhales heavily. He needs to stop himself now before he let’s on too much. “I mean - I can handle myself.” _But can you_ , he thinks to himself and he realises there are angry tears in his eyes. He grits his teeth to fight them off. “I know it sounds whiny but I just want her to treat me like I’m normal!” He practically yells the last part and is embarrassed almost right away.

 

“I’ve never seen you like this before. Mikasa really pissed you off, huh?” Levi pauses. “You’re cute when you’re angry.”

 

And suddenly, Eren’s not embarrassed at all. “And then there’s the thing with you - and -” Eren hesitates for entirely different reasons.

 

Levi raises an eyebrow. “It’s okay, I’m used to people talking shit about me.”

 

“It’s not really that,” Eren scowls down at his hands. “She thinks you’re going to hurt me.” God, wait, he shouldn’t have said that. God.

 

Levi’s quiet for a long time and when Eren feels brave enough to look at him, he sees an expression so soft it looks out of place on Levi’s features. “If I ever do that,” Levi says, voice low. “I’ll kick my own ass.”

 

Eren’s head goes fuzzy and just then the front door bursts open and Hanji’s familiar voice is calling, “Ooh, hoo!” through the house.

 

Levi’s eyes don’t leave Eren as he calls, “In here, shitty glasses.”

Hanji practically _bounds_ into the kitchen, carrying two grocery bags and a messenger bag over one shoulder. When they see Eren, their eyes go so wide he’s scared they’re gonna consume their whole face, and they make a high pitched squealing noise. “Eren!” Hanji cries like they’ve just seen their favourite person in the world. “What are you doing here -” they break off and narrow their eyes when they see Levi without his jacket on. “What _are_ you doing here?”

 

Levi stands up as Eren’s blush spreads all the way down his neck. “What are _you_ doing? What happened to ‘I’ll be home at five’?”

 

Hanji puts the grocery bags on the kitchen counter, eyes finally returning to their normal size. “I snuck out early because I just missed you so dearly,” they say, voice dripping with false saccharin. Eren watches as the two of them unload the grocery bags, mostly of food and cleaning supplies. Hanji bumps their hip into Levi; Levi flicks them in the temple. The interaction makes the tears that were still pressing at the back of Eren’s eyes melt away a little. They seem so easy in their friendship that Eren can’t help but smile.

 

“What is this shit,” Levi says, pulling mismatched vegetables out of the bag. Holding a potato in his hand, he glares at Hanji, “Don’t you dare try to make another potato battery, you set the house on fire last time.”

 

Hanji takes the potato from Levi. “No, grumpy, I’m going to make dinner.”

 

Levi looks thoroughly horrified at the prospect and casts Eren a glance. “Eren, if you get hungry let me know and I’ll order you real food.”

 

Hanji makes an exaggerated gasp. “You’re so _rude_ to me,” they huff, moving to stand behind Levi and putting their hands on his shoulders. They start to steer him towards the kitchen doorway. “Get out, I want it to be a surprise. You too, Eren!” They call and Eren stands up, startled, still gripping Levi’s jacket in his hands. He takes two steps before Hanji is rushing over to guide him by the shoulders out, too.

 

“I’m going to have to get a kitchen door,” Hanji sighs, rapping their knuckles on the bare doorway before turning back around to go about whatever it is they’re doing in the kitchen.

 

Levi sighs heavily and doesn’t bother to argue with Hanji, instead just pacing back through the living room and turning down the hallway towards the left with Eren following him. There are only four doors along it, one of which has a poster of the periodic table hanging crookedly on it; one of the edges has peeled off, as if the tape has come loose. Levi disappears into the room across from it and Eren steps over what looks like a bucket of tar to follow him.

 

It’s his bedroom, Eren realises, sucking a breath in between his teeth. Levi’s bedroom is small, with a made bed that takes up most of the space and a single dresser that doesn’t even have a single smudge against the wood top. The walls are the same muted beige colour as the rest of the house and Eren notices that, although there are no posters, there are a few photos tacked up neatly near the door frame. He recognises Isabel and Farlan in one of them, and Hanji, Petra, and Auruo in another, though there are other photos of people that Eren’s never seen. Levi isn’t in any of them.

 

Levi doesn’t seem phased by Eren’s awkward lingering in the doorway and just sits on the edge of his bed, absentmindedly reaching for his packets before looking up at Eren and holding a hand out. “Hand me that, would you?”

 

Eren’s forgotten that he still has Levi’s jacket in his hands and it almost aches to unpeel his fingers from the fabric has he hands it over. Levi produces another of those nicotine gum packages and sticks a piece between his teeth before looking at Eren, who flushes.

 

“Eren, if you’re uncomf-”

“No,” Eren interrupts hastily. “I’m not.” To prove his point, he crosses the distance between the doorway and Levi, hesitating before sitting next to him on the bed. He can’t breathe all over again and it has nothing to do with being on the back of a motorcycle this time.

 

“Eren,” Levi starts and there’s something serious in his tone that makes Eren meet his eyes. “Do you really want this? This me and you thing.” He does that thing again, where he bites his lower lip. “I know that your sister’s opposed and all that other shit, but try not to let other people make your decisions for you, Eren. And for the love of all that is holy please don’t take this as like a pressure thing because I'd be so fucking pissed at myself -”

 

“I do,” Eren interrupts before Levi can go any further. “I do want this.”

 

And he does. Eren’s not sure he’s ever wanted anything more in his entire life, except maybe his mom back.He wants to get to know Levi, and maybe, not now, not just yet, but maybe he wants Levi to get to know him, too. Levi’s seen Eren at a point that not even Mikasa has, having a panic attack inside of a diner room, and he still wanted to keep him around anyway. Even after _that_ he hasn’t looked at Eren any different, hasn’t stepped around him timidly or treated him like he’s something fragile. After all of this, Levi’s still looking at Eren like he wants this, too.

 

“Okay. Good.” Levi nods. “Because you’re really fucking cute.”

 

Eren grins and Levi looks at him for a moment more before lifting a hand to run his fingers through Eren’s hair, keeping his thumb pressed against Eren’s cheek. “I’m gonna kiss you now,” he tells him and Eren barely has time to nod before Levi is closing the distance between them.

 

Eren’s been kissed before, really kissed, in the days before the hospital, by a couple of girls and this one guy that he almost had a thing with during the summer after middle school, but they weren’t quite like this. He’s on fire, he thinks desperately, but as Levi kisses him gently, mouth slow against his he finds himself pressing closer. His hands fluttering nervously before his right one finds purchase on Levi’s forgotten jacket, fingers gripping tight to the jacket. Eren’s heart is beating so fast he’s afraid it’s going to tear a hole right through his chest. Levi’s mouth tastes like the gum he’s chewing.

 

When Levi releases him, mouth agape and looking flushed for the first time, he says, “Not so bad at this, kid.”

 

“Thanks,” Eren rasps out. He wants to kiss Levi again and before he can overthink it, before he can chicken out, he does. He intends for a quick one, but Levi keeps his hands in Eren’s hair and holds him there and God, _he’s making out with Levi_. Eren can’t wait to tell Armin about this.

 

The clearing of a throat sends Eren to his feet and staring wide-eyed at a particularly smug looking Hanji. “Hey lovebirds,” they say and Eren wants to melt into a puddle right then and there. “Dinner’s in the oven, so you can come back into the kitchen now.”

Levi’s entirely too calm about the whole thing, Eren thinks, as he stands and brushes his shirt off. “You could’ve knocked first.”

“The door was open,” Hanji argues, flashing a brilliant grin and then an odd sort of wink at Eren.

 

Levi just sighs and follows Hanji out the door, but not before getting a hold of his usual loose grip on Eren’s wrist.

 

“Dinner”, according to Hanji, is little more than a steamed vegetable _concoction_ that doesn’t look very edible at all and smells only slightly better.  Hanji keeps insisting that they threw in all these spices to make it extra special as Eren pushes the food around his plate and cuts it into smaller pieces with his fork, every so often sparing glances at Levi who keeps his legs stretched under the table. Eren can feel Levi’s foot pressed against his calf and it makes him drop his fork more than once.

 

Eren almost feels bad for not eating at all - for various reasons - but Hanji just takes his and Levi’s leftovers and scrapes it onto their own plate. The sound of the fork scraping against the glass plate makes Eren’s teeth ache.

 

“You know what’s this weekend?” Hanji says excitedly with a mouthful of vegetables. Eren expects them to follow up with the answer but they just stare wide-eyed, going back and forth between Eren and Levi expectantly.

 

Levi stares back. “Oh, fuck, it’s your shitty concert thing -”

 

“Screaming Saturday!” Hanji squeals and nearly knocks their glass of water over when they fling their arms out to do some sort of rendition of jazz hands. Levi eyes it warily like the spillage would be the worst thing to ever happen to him.

 

“Is that one of the bands?” Eren asks innocently and the deep flash in Hanji’s eyes tell him that he’s just made a terrible mistake.

 

“ _No_ ,” Hanji says exasperated, leaning so far over the table that Eren has to lean back. “It’s this annual musical festival where all these local bands come play at Sina Field - you know, that huge empty lot between the city and here - and ooh, it’s always so exciting!” They grab one of Eren’s hands. “You’re coming, Levi said you were, right, Levi?”

 

Levi stands up and picks up their abandoned plates in a pile. “If he still wants to,” he says, crossing the kitchen towards the sink. “Don’t force him.”

 

“Well, of course he does,” Hanji answers on Eren’s behalf.  “Because you’ll be there!”

  
Levi unsuccessfully hides his soft smile. 


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally 2 separate chapters but I merged it into one 6k one aww. I've been??? feeling a little iffy about the fic in general the past few days so sighs the updates might slow down for a while. I do love you all though.
> 
> Introducing Annie and more tattoos. 
> 
> Triggers for alcohol abuse Mikasa why.

Mikasa isn’t there when Levi takes Eren home sometime near sunset. He leaves before Eren has time to hand him his jacket back and so Eren keeps it folded in his hands when he goes inside, fishing the spare key out from under the mat. Mikasa’s truck is still gone from the driveway, and the house looms large and empty, the fading sun casting eerie shadows through the living room. The silence makes Eren itch all over and so he flips the television on, flinching when it’s a news story about a house fire.

Eren had said some pretty awful things to Mikasa before she stormed out of the house, yelling about how Eren’s right and doesn’t need her around, and he bites into the knuckle of his thumb with worry, glancing towards the front door every few seconds as if she’ll walk through any minute. He thinks of Mikasa’s drinking and the anxiety in chest swells and nearly consumes him whole the more he thinks about it. God, if he had set her off.

She’d promised him though, that it wouldn’t get out of hand again, and he had believed her. He does believe her still, but that doesn't stop him from chewing a hole through the skin of his hand as he stays in the living room and waits. When an hour and half passes, he opens the address book on the table and grabs the phone; the first name he sees is Marco’s, and he thinks of what Marco told him, about how it’d be alright for Eren to call him. So he does, moving his nervous biting to his index finger until Marco picks up. “Hello?”

“Hey, uh, it’s Eren.”

“Eren!” Marco chirps. “Is everything alright?”

“I - I was just wondering if maybe you’ve heard from Mikasa at all, lately.”

Marco goes quiet for a minute and Eren thinks he hears urgent whispering that may or may not be Jean. “Um,” Marco drawls. “Jean says that he saw her about half an hour ago. With, er, Reiner and Annie.” He sounds like he’s lying and the more Eren hears Jean whispering in the background, the more he thinks that they’re covering for Mikasa.

“Okay,” Eren says anyway. “Thanks.” He’s not convinced at all but he supposes that as long as Mikasa isn’t in any immediate danger, he shouldn’t be tearing himself up too bad. A part of him still does, a part of him that insists that if Mikasa falls back into her old ways that it’ll be his fault, and the voice in his head grows louder. Eren hangs up before Marco can reply and holds his head in his hands, trying to breathe. He fucked up, again.

A part of him itches to call his dad of all people but he pushes the thought out before it can get any grip in his head; they’ve never needed Grisha before, and Eren certainly doesn't need him now. Eren didn’t need him when Mikasa would come home late at night, stumbling and throwing up in the bathroom; MIkasa didn’t need him when she found Eren _that_ day. Even still, the stillness of the house isn’t helping at all and Eren sort of wishes that they did need Dad.

In the end, Eren argues with himself, getting his breathing under control, until another couple of hours pass. He stares at the TV for the majority of it, holds Levi’s jacket in his lap, until the sky outside is the inky purple colour it takes on before it ebbs into midnight. Eren almost calls Marco again, asking him if he’s sure Mikasa’s alright. He even almost calls Levi, but ultimately decides against it; worrying him over yet another thing is not something Eren wants to do. Levi doesn’t deserve to shoulder Eren’s problems. Eren’s reminded of how upset Levi sounded when he called him and he realises that he never asked Levi about it. Even though Levi seemed alright, especially as they said goodbye for the night with another one of those kisses, it just adds another thing to Eren’s list of Things to Feel Guilty About.

He’s mulling this over when the roar of Mikasa’s truck outside announces her arrival. Eren’s at the door before she’s even turned the lock. She jumps a little when she sees him. “Eren-”

“Where were you?” he asks, and he can smell the alcohol on her breath. She doesn’t seem shitfaced drunk, but she’s still a little wobbly when she pushes past Eren to trek down the hall. “Did you drive like that?”

“Does it matter?” she snaps and Eren leans back in surprise.

“You could’ve gotten hurt,” Eren argues back with the same harsh tone that’s in Mikasa’s voice, but she just sighs and rubs a hand across her forehead.

“Can we talk about this tomorrow?” she sighs and Eren goes to yell, _no, no this can’t wait until tomorrow_ , but she’s already turning away and heading down the hallway towards the back bedrooms. Eren almost follows her but she’s inside and shutting her bedroom door loudly before he can make an informed decision to so, and for a moment he just stares after her dejected.

He stands there, gritting his teeth and digging his nails into his palm; he did this. He did this to her because he can’t get over himself, because in his desperation to pretend he’s normal he’s been inherently selfish, and all the old self hate that he’s been trying to push down comes surging back in that moment. It’s nobody’s fault but his own, not Mikasa’s, our their dad’s, not Levi’s or Jean and Marco’s. This is on him.

The realisation rocks him to the core, but he’s not going to cry; instead, he’s just angry. Angry for letting this happen, angry at himself for letting it get back to this point. It only took a few weeks of him being home for him to screw everything up again.

It’s several more minutes before Eren can drag himself back to his bedroom, where he buries his face into the leather of Levi’s jacket and screams.

~X~

Apparently, “talk about this tomorrow” means not talk about it all in Mikasa’s language, because in the morning when Mikasa wakes him up to take him to his therapy appointment, she doesn’t make any attempts to approach the subject at all. She tells him that Pyxis called to talk about the group therapy thing while he was sleeping, and that he gave the go ahead for the day; they’ll alternate, MIkasa informs him, every other week he’ll between individual and group. It’s not a bad idea, she agrees, but that’s all she has to say about it.

Eren’s still angry from the night before, curling and uncurling his fists in his lap as Mikasa drives him there in silence. He starts to say something a handful of times, but always stops himself for different reasons; because he’s mad all over again, because he’s afraid he’ll just make things worse. The fact of the matter is, he doesn’t know how to _handle_ this. Eren still believes he can take care of himself, but taking care of Mikasa is entirely out of his realm. That other, selfish voice always lingering in the back of his head whispers that he shouldn’t have to, that neither of them should be obligated to take care of the other. He’s not sure which voice to listen to.

In the end, Eren’s left staring after Mikasa’s truck as it tears down the road without having said anything at all.

Armin greets Eren when he gets inside, looking positively enthralled when he tells Eren that Pyxis mentioned that it was okay for them to go to group therapy together. He’s already tugging him by the sleeve of his jacket before Eren can get his bearings, half-dragging him to one of those large rec rooms that Eren rarely went into. The room itself has a line of wide windows along one wall, with the blinds have drawn, and there are motivational posters on the others. One wall has a large chalkboard with the words _Group Therapy_ written across it in cursive.There’s a circle of chairs set up in the middle of the room, with a few other patients occupying some of the seats and whispering to each other.  One of the other therapists that Eren doesn’t recognise wanders around the room.

Armin leads Eren to a set of chairs and collapses into one, leaning towards Eren with wide eyes, “How was your week? Did you see Levi again?” Armin’s always been kind of a gossip, Eren recalls with a fond smile.

“Well, I actually went to his house -”

Armin’s eyes grow to the size of dinner plates and he jolts Eren’s arm. “That’s so _cool_ , what happened?”

The skin all over Eren’s body goes hot remembering it and he has to pull away from Armin. “I’m pretty sure we’re, like, _together_ now.”

The noise that Armin makes reminds Eren of Krista. Armin looks ready to ask about a million more questions, but the therapist Eren saw earlier claps her hands together to draw their attention and peers at the group over the top of her glasses. “I see some new faces today,” she announces, eyes flickering first to Eren and then to a tall, dark-haired boy slouching low in his chair. “Shall we introduce ourselves?”

She points to her left and a girl with pigtails that remind Eren of Isabel stands up wearing a gentle smile that looks a little sad underneath. She introduces herself as Mina and gives her diagnosis and reason for being here, and as the other patients do the same, Eren starts to panic. He hasn’t said his own diagnosis outloud in months, hasn’t even allowed himself to think it, and before there’s no time, he grabs a hold of Armin’s arm and asks, “We don't have to say that, do we?”

Armin’s eyes soften. “You don’t have to,” he promises. “Rico encourages it, you know to help the healing process, but she won’t force you to.”

Eren can barely swallow the lump in his throat as the tall boy, the other new face, looks up at his term. He simply introduces himself as “Bertholdt” and doesn’t give any other information and Eren’s more comforted by that than he thinks he should be. When it’s Eren’s turn and all eyes are on him, Armin pats his shoulder in support,giving  a soft nod when Eren shoots him a pleading look. “I’m Eren,” he says around the clog still in his throat. He means to say more, to give them what they’ve given him but he finds that he can’t, and casts his gaze downwards so as not to be met with any of their stares.

Armin is the last, and that’s when Rico dissolves the group into revealing their emotions and talking about what’s going on with them. How they’re feeling, and why, and all the usual stuff that Eren fully expected from this. For the first meeting, he just listens to their stories; listens to Armin talk about missing his grandfather, and about Hannah being worried for her boyfriend. In fact, the only two people who don’t say anything are Eren and Bertholdt, the latter of whom keeps his eyes fixed on the floor.

When the session is over (with a prayer that Eren didn’t follow and Armin did), Armin starts talking to Eren about the upcoming art contest. “I’ve decided to do a mosaic of the ocean,” Armin says as Eren walks with him towards the cafeteria. “I had to convince Pyxis and Rico to let me, you know because of the whole glass thing, but as long as somebody’s with me while I work on it, it’s alright. I wish I had more time, though.” He sighs.

“You’ll get it done,” Eren promises. “And I’ll totally be there to see you show it off to everyone.”

Armin’s answering smile is always worth it, Eren thinks.

~X~

Eren sits with Armin for a little while while he works on his project; it’s amazing, really, how Armin carefully selects from a tray of broken glass (under the watchful eye of none other than Rico, who Eren’s beginning to assume is Armin’s personal therapist). Most of the pieces look the same to Eren, but Armin insists the various shades of blue are the key. Eren thinks his friend’s more artistically gifted than anyone else he’s ever met.

When Mikasa comes to get Eren, she has somebody with her and Eren spends a solid three minutes hovering by the door before steeling himself up to cross the parking lot to meet them. The girl hanging out the passenger side window of Mikasa’s truck looks Eren up and down when he reaches them. She’s a pretty blonde with eyes that feel a little cold boring into Eren’s face; he shifts uneasily and opens his mouth to ask, well, who the hell she is, when Mikasa honks the horn.

The girl shifts over in her seat as Eren opens the door and climbs into the cab of the truck. Mikasa seems entirely unphased as Eren glares at her profile past the blonde girl. Anxiety gnaws at his stomach, getting worse the longer they sit in silence. The girl crammed in the cab with them doesn’t say anything either, just stares out the windshield and occasionally turns to whisper something to Mikasa. Eren alternates between watching them and keeping his face turned away. He’s never seen the girl before and he wracks his brain for any mention of, well, _anyone_ that might identify her. He vaguely remembers Marco saying the name _Annie_ when Eren called him yesterday.

Eren ends up chewing another hole into his thumb by the time they get home, the girl (Annie?) still with them. He’s out the door of the truck before Mikasa can even kill the engine, on the presumption that they still aren’t speaking, and inside the house in the next instant. He’s two feet away from his bedroom door, the house phone in his hand, when he hears Mikasa calling his name.

He almost ignores it completely, but ends up turning back with a sigh, still clutching the house phone. Mikasa lingers in the hallway with the girl behind her; neither of them look directly at Eren. “Eren,” Mikasa repeats. “This is Annie. She’s going to stay with us for a few days, if that’s alright.”

Eren stares at the two of them for a moment. He wants to ask _why_ ; why Annie will be staying with them, why Mikasa is allowing her, why Eren’s never even heard Annie’s name until yesterday, and then the next she’s more or less _moving_ in, why Mikasa isn’t _talking_ to him. But he doesn’t ask any of that, instead, he just says, “Okay,” and turns back towards his door. “Levi’s going to pick me up tomorrow. If that’s alright.”

Eren shuts his bedroom door behind him a little louder than necessary.

~X~

Eren isn’t met with the resistance he’s expecting. Instead, all he gets from Mikasa the next day when he’s pacing the hallway and waiting for Levi and Hanji to make their appearance, is, “It’s hot out, so drink a lot of water and make sure you eat.” Eren wonders if Annie talked to Mikasa at all about it, if she had a hand in _any_ of this, and it makes him uneasy. He’s not sure why - this is what he wanted, after all. To be left alone to do as he pleases, with Levi, with anyone, really. It doesn’t explain why everything still feels so _off._

Eren’s expecting Levi to show up with his motorcycle, so when Eren answers the knock on the door to find Levi and Hanji - Levi looking thoroughly _done_ and Hanji wearing a large grin - he can’t help but laugh at the loud, rather hideous station wagon idling in the background. It’s one of the older models, with the wood paneling on the side and ridiculously large back.

“Eren!” Hanji greets with their usual exuberance, throwing their arms around Eren’s shoulders. He’s keenly aware of Mikasa and Annie still sitting in the living room. A part of him wants to rub Levi and Hanji in Mikasa’s face, but that’s childish and pathetic. When Hanji releases him, Levi swoops in for the rescue, circling Eren’s wrist with his fingers.

“You’re going to suffocate him,” Levi says to Hanji in that scolding tone that he only adopts when speaking to them. Levi glances at Eren then. “Is your sister home?”

Eren panics a little. “Y-yeah. Do you want to meet her?” _Please say no._ Rubbing Levi in Mikasa’s face wouldn’t be worth it.

“Nah,” Levi waves with his free hand, but before Eren can breathe a sigh of relief he hears Mikasa say his name behind him; his heartbeat skyrockets and the panic rushes back to his throat.

“Are you leaving now?” Mikasa asks and Eren glances back to see her cross her arms. She’s not even looking at him, but past him, and Eren doesn’t have the bravery to follow her gaze. “Don’t forget to drink water, it’s hot out--”

“I got it,” Eren says quickly, adjusting the backpack strap on his shoulder with his free hand. His face flares red-hot when he realises Levi still has a grip on his wrist. Mikasa narrows her eyes slightly when she finally looks at Eren, but doesn’t say anything else and walks back towards the living room, where the sounds of some game show on the TV ring out; Eren can hear Annie calling out the answers.

“What a ray of sunshine,” Levi snorts, tugging on Eren’s wrist to pull him out of the doorway. “Come on, Hanji’s practically vibrating with excitement about this stupid concert.”

“It’s not stupid!” Hanji cries, bouncing towards the station wagon as Eren fumbles to shut the door to the house behind him. “It _is_ exciting, stop being such a grumpy old man.” They pull a face before getting into the driver’s side of the car; Eren’s expecting Levi to take the passenger side, but instead he climbs into the backseat with Eren.

“Stop calling me old,” Levi complains loudly, over the roar of the engine. “Eren, tell them I’m not old.”

Eren fidgets. “Aren’t you only, like, nineteen?”

Hanji barks a laugh and Levi blinks at Eren a couple of times. “Nineteen,” he repeats. “I'm so flattered.”

Eren blushes again. “You’re not?”

“I’ll be twenty-one in December,” Levi sighs. “Got saddled with a Christmas birthday. I get fucked over every year.”

“Oh,” Eren pauses. “You are kind of old.”

Hanji laughs so hard Eren’s afraid they’re going to swerve into the next lane and crash into the Toyota cruising along side of them. Levi pinches the bridge of his nose for a second before peering at Eren over the top of his hand. “Don’t worry,” he says, sounding a little nasally. “I’ve got you to keep me young.”

Eren’s almost 100% certain that he looks thoroughly dumbfounded as he stares slack jawed and breathless at Levi, but luckily Hanji cackles again and says, “I’ve got to get myself a pretty, young boyfriend, too!”  

Hanji and Levi bicker for the entire thirty minutes or so it takes to actually find a parking spot along the road stretching beside Sina Field. The field itself is mostly empty lot, with a tree here and there like somebody once started a forest project and abandoned it. It’s still a little early in the day - before noon - and already there are groups of people milling around with makeshift stages set up in a loose “C” shape along the edges of the field. Eren can see the trailers with weird band names painted on their sides. Eren starts to stress over the fact that the crowd will just inflate in size but when Levi takes his usual loose hold around Eren’s wrist, he breathes a little easier. Funny, how that happens.

“Oooh!” Hanji squeals again once they’re unloaded from the car. They jump up and down twice with excitement before spinning on their heel fast enough to blur to face Levi and Eren, putting their hands on their hips. “We have to hear everyone play, no slacking off this year.”

Levi exhales, like he knows there’s no using arguing with Hanji, and turns to Eren. “Do you have my jacket?”

Eren quickly shrugs off the backpack slung over his shoulder and unzips it to pull out Levi’s jacket from where it’s folded at the bottom. When he hands it back to him, Levi doesn’t put it on, but rifles through the pockets until he finds his pack of nicotine gum. Eren hadn’t even realised it was still in there. “After I get rich off my PacMan- _Dance_ machine I’m going to hire a pharmaceutical company to make nicotine gum that doesn’t taste like shit,” Levi vows, pulling a face as he chews.

“Why’d you quit if you’re just gonna be a baby about it?” a familiar voice says and Eren looks over to see Isabel (and Farlan, albeit looking a little reluctant) headed for them. She releases her grip on Farlan’s sleeve when she reaches them. Her eyes flicker to Levi’s hand still around Eren’s and her smile goes a little wider.

“I decided to stop being an asshole,” Levi replies, stepping closer to Eren when he notices Isabel’s gaze. “Gotta make Eren think I’m a good guy and all.”

“You quit smoking for me?” Eren asks in surprise.

Levi looks at him and winks.

~X~

Isabel ends up convincing Hanji (and be default Eren and Levi) into sticking close to her and Farlan as they lead the trio back to where they’ve already claimed a spot in the middle of the field (“You can hear everything better here!” Isabel promised Hanji and to be honest, it was all over from there). The group of people that Levi reluctantly calls friends are there, greeting Hanji and Levi with enthusiasm and Eren with wariness. Levi watches Eren shift uneasily and shrink behind him; it’d work if Eren wasn’t at least four inches taller.

Petra and Auruo greet Eren with friendly smiles, although Eren still looks incredibly uncomfortable. They’re barely there for five minutes before Hanji is dragging Petra towards a band that’s tuning their instruments on one of the makeshift stages and Levi is pulling Eren by his wrist through the thickest parts of the crowd. He isn’t about to have Eren stand there and make himself uneasy and anxious for no good reason. That and he thinks it’s best to get away now while Hanji is distracted before they can force both Levi and Eren to listen to that shit music.

By the time the crowd thins they’re far enough away that Levi can just _barely_ make out Hanji’s shrieks in the distance (thank _God_ ) and he releases Eren. It’s the first time Levi’s seen him without a jacket on; Eren’s paler than he initially thought. Still not getting enough to eat. His wrist felt fragile under Levi’s hands.

Eren feels fragile in general.

Eren’s staring at him and when Levi meets his gaze, he blushes like he always does but doesn’t look away. He buries his hands into the pockets of his jeans and rocks on his feet, and God, he’s just so adorable and _innocent_. He’s too good for Levi, but Levi’s always been a selfish son of a bitch and Eren swears up and down that for some ungodly reason he wants this, too. It’s gone beyond patching Eren up, it’s something far deeper at this point and Levi knows he’s in too deep but then Eren says something, anything, and he’s forgetting why he ever doubted anything in the first place. He supposes he should hate the kid for that, he’d hate anyone else. Levi doesn’t think he could ever hate Eren.

There’s still too much about Eren that Levi doesn’t know, still all that unsaid mystery behind that fumbling exterior and a part of Levi wants to open Eren up and examine his insides but the _nice_ part, the one that always asks Eren if he’s uncomfortable and pulls him away from large crowds and rubs his back in restaurant bathrooms while he has an anxiety attack over a sink , stops him. That’s the part that waits patiently, that says, “Sorry this place is so boring” instead of demanding to know everything about him.

Eren smiles. He looks beautiful when he does that. _God, fuck, this isn’t how things were supposed to be_. “Nah, it’s okay. Better than sitting at home with Mikasa.” He makes a face and Levi chuckles. There are a few other stragglers milling around, a girl laughing loudly somewhere to their left, a guy boasting about how drunk he got the other night somewhere to their right. Eren’s standing close enough that Levi has to tilt his head back to meet his eyes.

“Still not getting along?” Levi asks.

Eren shakes his head and makes a faint humming noise, glancing away like it’s a subject he doesn’t want to approach. That portion of Levi that wants to pry protests, but the nice part wins out once again, and so he simply reaches over to lace his fingers through Eren’s, tugging him towards the general direction of the road where Hanji’s station wagon is parked somewhere along it. “Come on, let’s go wait in the car until they suck it up and play some actual music. It’s hot as fuck out.” He reaches into his pocket with his free hand and pulls out the set of keys he snagged from Hanji ages ago. “The sweet bliss of AC.”

Eren’s too agreeable, Levi decides as he pulls him back towards the car. Eren hovers outside while Levi unlocks the driver's side of Hanji’s station wagon, turning the key backwards in the ignition to start the battery but not the engine; Hanji’s dumb hipster music filters over the radio the moment he does, and Levi switches the station with a scowl.

Levi manages to pull Eren into the backseat of the car with him, the poor thing fidgeting beside him like he’s nervous. Sometimes Eren will glance at him and look downright amazed and it makes something in Levi ache all over. He doesn’t think he deserves to be looked at like that by anybody, let alone someone like Eren. “So,” Levi starts in the silence, Eren looking at him with those wide eyes of his. Levi wishes he wouldn’t do that. “Wanna play twenty questions?”

Eren blinks. “Isn’t that that handheld thing where you answer yes or no questions, and it guesses what you’re thinking of?”

Levi frowns. “No, but that sounds terrifying. I mean the dating one, you know, get to know each other and all that crap.”

“Oh,” Eren says, looking embarrassed. “Yeah, okay. You go first.”

“Have you ever had a boyfriend?”

Eren’s eyes widen impossibly further. “I - there was this one guy a couple of summers ago,” Eren’s entire face turns red and Levi wonders how someone can blush so damn much. “But not - not really. But I had girlfriends in middle school.”

“Yeah, didn’t we all,” Levi says, stretching his arm out across the back of the seat. “Your turn.”

“Er, what’s your favourite movie?” _Ah, such a simple boy._

“That one _Star Trek_ movie where they have to save the whales. That shit was gold.”

And then Eren says the most horrible words Levi’s ever heard come out of his mouth, “I’m more of a _Star Wars_ person.”

Levi actively leans away from Eren and scowls. “This is never going to work. I can’t be seen with someone who likes _Star Wars_ better than _Trek_.”

“What’s wrong with _Star Wars_?” Eren asks, whilst doing a terrible job of hiding a smile. What a little shit.

Levi rolls his eyes. “Everything. We’re going to have to marathon the original series and you will realise the error of your ways.” He lifts his arm off the back of the seat and pokes Eren in the temple. “My turn. What did you have to say to Mikasa to get her to let you come to this shitfest?”

Eren pauses and furrows his brow. “Nothing.”

Levi stares at him. “Absolutely nothing.”

Eren shakes his head. “It’s weird as hell, but nothing. She has this friend over, Annie or something, maybe she talked to her, I don’t know.” He scowls at his hands for a moment, looking as if he’s deep in thought.

“Huh,” Levi says. “You’re actually capable of cursing.”

Eren glances at him. “What?”

Levi pokes him in the face again. “You cursed. Like, actually cursed, like a damn sailor. Say ‘fuck’ for me.”

Eren blinks at him but says, “Fuck”, like it’s just any other word. Levi wants to hear Eren say a whole lot more than that, to be honest.

“I’m a terrible influence on you,” Levi sighs. “Okay, go ahead, ask your question.”

Eren contemplates, fixing his gaze on his hands again and his furrowing his brow like he’s fighting the courage to say something. Levi observes the battle on his expression for several long moments before Eren looks at him, something steely in the off-green of his eyes. “When I called yesterday,” he starts and Levi knows where the conversation is going before Eren finishes his sentence. “Why did you sound so upset?”

He just cares, Levi knows. He’s just concerned, like anyone who willingly sticks themselves to your side like glue would, but that doesn’t stop Levi from digging his own fingers into his knee and taking breaths through his mouth. Eren can’t know about Erwin, about anyone _like_ Erwin. He’s too good to be tainted by that, and yeah, just being with _Levi_ is damning enough but he’d rather lessen the amount of corruption he’s responsible for. He can’t save Eren, can't even get to know him like he so badly wants to do, if he’s exposing him to all those dark patches.

But Levi’s not a liar, not even when it comes to protecting people, so instead of answering he pushes his fingers through the hair at the back of Eren’s neck and pulls him down to kiss him. Eren makes a noise of surprise but melts into Levi’s touch immediately, hands pressing into the leather of the car seat to maintain balance. Eren’s so obviously, _painfully_ inexperienced that Levi almost feels bad for pulling him into a kiss off guard. That’s not so say he’s _bad_ because he’s not, just awkward, like he is in everything else. He’s most definitely a virgin.

Levi is an awful person.

Eren may be awkward but he’s awfully brave in the long run, Levi thinks as Eren moves a hand to his knee. Levi’s about two seconds away from telling Eren that he could totally do more with those hands if he wanted to, when there’s a sharp tap on the window of the car. Eren scares easier than anyone Levi’s ever met and jumps back like he’s been electrocuted. Hanji is squinting at them through the window, Petra covering her mouth, eyes crinkled in a smile, behind them. “Did you ditch me so you could _make out_?!” Hanji shouts through the glass, sounding truly offended.

  
Levi reaches across Eren to pop open the door handle. “Stop cockblocking,” he says as Hanji opens the door wider and ducks down to stare at them. “You’re starting to make it a habit.”

Hanji rolls their eyes and reaches in, seizing Eren’s hand and nearly yanking him out of the car. “Come on, the Titans are going to play!”

“Titans?” Eren asks before Levi can stop him, looking in horror at Hanji who makes the most disgusting screeching noise ever. They sound like a dying bat.

“The _best_ band that our country has ever birted!” Hanji cries, actually pulling Eren out of the car this time. Levi crawls out after them to rescue the poor boy from Hanji’s clutches. “They got a record deal and everything this year, I thought they weren’t going to show, I’m so excited. Last year the lead singer signed my shirt and I almost threw up because I was so happy . . .”

Hanji rambles on, dragging Eren through the crowd. He keeps sending pleading glances back to Levi who follows as closely as he can and answers with apologetic shrugs. By the time Hanji finally lets Eren go, they’re standing far closer to one of those stages then Levi thinks is necessary, where Hanji’s dumb band is set up, greeting the crowd with over-exuberant “Hell yeah!”s that make Levi’s head hurt. He manages to pull Eren into a patch of grass that’s not completely infested with gross, sweaty strangers. Eren looks relieved.

Eren listening to music is probably the cutest fucking shit Levi’s ever seen and that’s saying something considering one time he saw a cat carry its kitten out of a building on fire. He somehow finds a way to nod his head to a beat Levi can’t decipher past the screeching guitars and frantic drumming. He does this with every song Hanji forces them to listen to and Levi almost feels like a creep watching him during all of them.

Hanji doesn’t give up until it’s sunset and the headache that started in Levi’s temples hours ago has spread into a full blown migraine all the way down his neck. Hanji announces they’re hungry with a fervor that’s almost frightening; Levi thinks Hanji just doesn’t want to admit they couldn’t handle listening to all the alternative indie shit they always play at night at this dumb event.

Eren looks incredibly tired and he’d push Hanji into taking the kid home right away if he wasn’t also worried about the fact that Eren probably hasn’t eaten all day. He looks like he doesn’t get enough to eat as it is, and Levi’s not about to be responsible for neglecting him further.

“Levi, let’s go to your work,” Hanji decides for them after exuberant goodbye hugs from both Petra and Isabel. (Both of whom also hugged Eren and left him his usual blushing stuttering mess.)

The last thing Levi wants is fucking _Taco Bell_ but one glance at Eren and he’s actually agreeing to it. Like Hanji said:

Eren will be the death of him.

~X~

Hanji is recounting to Eren and Levi every single aspect of their day, although they were with them for most of it. That doesn't seem to bother Hanji, even as Levi makes faces behind their back that make Eren press the back of his hand to his mouth to keep from laughing. “Ooh, ooh, and when you guys were making out in the car, Petra and I ran into this cute girl who knew Levi’s tattoo artist.”

Levi raises an eyebrow at Hanji. “Moblit?”

“Yes!” Hanji’s voice adapts a sort of dreamy tone. “Levi, go get another tattoo so I can see him again.”

“You could just call him like a normal person.”

“But it’s no fun that way,” Hanji pouts, the shadows from the setting sun defining the features of their face drastically. “Get another star or something.”

“Star?” Eren asks, looking at Levi with open curiosity. Levi glances at him and then sheds his leather jacket, laying it across Eren’s lap before pulling up the hem of his own t-shirt. Eren’s pretty sure he stops breathing for a solid ten seconds as Levi hikes up his shirt, exposing his ribs. Levi’s a lot more, well - _toned_ than Eren’s expecting and he probably stares a little too long before remembering that he’s supposed to be looking elsewhere. When he finally allows his gaze to wander, he sees a trail of open, five-pointed stars tattooed in the skin of Levi’s side. He doesn’t know how many there are, but a few here and there are coloured in with black.Eren extends a hand as if to touch them but pulls back at the last second.

Levi’s staring at him when Eren meets his eyes. “Did they hurt? When you got them I mean.”

“Someone’s shoving needles into your skin, of course it hurt,” Levi snorts, pulling his shirt back down. “This one was worse, though.” He points to the compass on his wrist.

“Tell him what they mean,” Hanji says in the calmest tone Eren’s ever heard them manage, and he sees them exchange glances with Levi in the rearview mirror.

Levi sighs and traces the point of his compass with an index finger. “There’s a star for every person I’ve ever given a fuck about.”

“Right,” Hanji says with a nod. “So that’s why you have to go see Moblit. To get Eren’s star. Ooh, look, the trip to the city is shorter if you take I-95, Levi.” Their voices picks up to their usual pitch and bubbly tone and they’re gesturing wildly at the city limits, the increase in street lights and darker paved roadways obvious. It’s still just the outskirts, and with the sun even lower on the horizon, the streets are mostly empty, but a part of Eren can’t help but wonder where his dad is right now. The other parts are still mulling over the star tattoo thing, his heart rate picking up when he thinks about it. It’s ridiculous to get a tattoo for someone you barely know, right? Care about at the time or not. Levi’s smarter than that.

They don’t drive that far into the city before Hanji is pulling into a particularly weathered-looking Taco Bell restaurant talking about their quesadilla's like it’s five star gourmet. “Who’s working?” Hanji asks Levi after they park the car. “Would they be willing to really extend that employee discount and give it to us free?”

“Pretty sure Gunther is,” Levi says, unbuckling his seat belt. “I don’t know about you, but he’ll give _me_ free food.”

Hanji seems entirely put out by this and pouts as the three of them climb out of the car; Levi glances at Eren over the top and says, “Bet I could beat you to the front door.”

“What?” Eren blinks at him but Levi’s already dashing to the entrance like he’s trying to outrun a giant, man-eating beast. Hanji cackles and jogs after him, and after a moment of sucking in deep breaths, Eren does too. He even manages to surpass Levi in his sprint, waiting by the front entrance whilst putting a hand to the stitch in his side.

“Damn,” Levi huffs, putting his hands on his knees. “Calm down there, Flash. You run track or something?”

“I used to go running a lot,” Eren tells him with a grin. “My friend Armin says if I was a professional runner they’d call me the Wind.”

“Your friend Armin’s a funny guy,” Levi says, standing up straight as Hanji finally meets up with them, having slowed to a walking pace several feet back.

“Enough testosterone,” Hanji complains, opening the glass door to the entrance. “Let’s get food.”

Eren would much rather _not_ get food, especially at a place like this. He stares distastefully up at the menu over the cash registers, wincing at the calorie counts set in the corners of the pictures and wrinkling his nose at the idea of eating any of that himself. Of course he’s hungry, but he’s long since learned how to handle that, how to ignore it, and he’s all for going without. He can’t remember the last time he even ate fast food, and maybe it’s not entirely something he should congratulate himself on, considering his situation, but even still.

Hanji has already ordered themselves a village’s worth of food before turning to Eren expectantly. He panics, and starts to say, “I don’t want anything,” but Levi interrupts before he can even get the second word out.

“Just order the kid some nachos,” he says, taking a hold of Eren’s wrist like he always does and tugging him back towards the dining area. “Tell Gunther it’s on me.”

Hanji gives a thumbs up, and leans over the counter to stare into the kitchen, shouting at some guy named Erd to “Hurry up!” Levi leads Eren to one of the booths in the far back of the restaurant, laying his jacket over a rip in the seam of the upholstery. He pulls Eren into the seat next to him before folding his hands on the tabletop.

“When was the last time you ate?” Levi asks suddenly and Eren looks over at him in surprise. He’s wearing an expression that Eren has seen countless times on Mikasa’s face and his chest tightens. He hadn’t been expecting Levi to catch on so soon.

“This morning,” Eren answers honestly, watching the flicker in Levi’s eyes. “I’m fine,” he tries to insist. Levi doesn’t look wholly convinced and in a panic and desperate attempt to void this conversation here and now, he leans forward and kisses him quickly. Levi’s eyes widen softly in surprise but he says nothing else as Hanji announces their arrival by dropping an entire tray of food on the table with a clatter.

“Stop kissing and look at all this food,” they say, their tone as dreamy as it was when they were talking about Moblit. “It’s like heaven on Earth.”

“It’s only heaven because it’s free,” Levi quips, poking at the nachos he had Hanji get with a twist to his lip. The cheese looks a little too rubbery to be edible.

“Don’t look a gift horse in the mouth,” Hanji says, mouth already stuffed full of chicken quesadilla.

Levi breaks a nacho chip in half and throws it at Hanji. They look thoroughly offended as it barely misses their glasses, hitting them in the face, before they launch a piece of sauce-coated chicken in retaliation. Their aim is entirely off and Eren ends up getting the brunt of it which makes Hanji cover their mouth with one hand and Levi snort loud enough to draw the attention of the guy mopping a few feet away from them.

Hanji looks at Eren in abject horror as he calmly takes the remaining half of the nacho chip from Levi’s grip and flicks it at them. “That’s not even fair!” Hanji cries as Eren smiles.

“I told you he was a secret little shit,” Levi says. “This is a two-sided war. And you,” he points a straw at Hanji. “Are on the losing side.”

Eren never expected to come home after spending four months in a psych ward to find himself being thrown out of a Taco Bell at 8:30 pm for getting into a food fight with the sort-of boyfriend that’s starting to see right through his poorly built facade (only to still treat him like he’s normal, but special all at the same time) and his eccentric best friend, but he thinks, as he throws his head back and laughs at the night sky, that it’s the best thing that’s happened to him in a long while.

In between complaining loudly about how disgusting food fights in general are and the fact that he didn’t get to eat at all, Levi slips his hand into Eren’s, and Eren realises that it’s the first time he’s been truly happy in years.

Like the calm before a storm.

 


	11. Chapter 11

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More things Eren doesn't know. Also Erwin. And a handjob.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi my name is krissie and im a sex-repusled asexual who doesn't know how to write a handjob to save her life. does this warrant upping the rating to explicit, i mean it is kind of //vague// (I mean I tend to skip over the smut in every fanfic I read so?? writing it????)
> 
> As usual bless your heart mind and souls for your comments and kudos they make my day every day. This is actually the last full chapter I have written so haha things will really slow down from here on out i"m terrible sorry, but I'll keep trying just for you guys kisskiss.

Erwin calls Levi non-stop for three days.

 

It’s like clockwork, every hour on the dot, like he has a watch surgically attached to his arm that beeps when it’s “Call Levi to Cry like a Little Bitch and Make Him Feel like a Shit Person” time. Not amount of Hanji reminding him that Erwin is fucked up and that Levi’s in the right to ignore him, like he was to walk away, is going to stop the walls Levi’s built up against Erwin to get graffitied with familiar “Levi, please”s. Honestly, Eren is Levi’s only hope but he’s still not ready to expose him to the black hole that Erwin Smith is. In fact, he’ll avoid that for as long as possible.

 

It’s late into the third day, and Levi’s already in a bad mood because in his attempts to ignore Erwin he missed a called from Eren, when there’s a knock on the door. It’s tentative but loud enough to draw Hanji from their bedroom and shoot Levi a look over the top of their glasses.

 

“Don’t answer it,” Hanji says sternly from the hallway as Levi aggressively throws the blanket across his lap to the side and stands up from the couch.

 

“Do you owe someone money,” Levi asks monotonously, dodging the coffee table to reach the front door. He ignores Hanji’s noise of protest and is in too sour of a mood to actually glance out the window or anything. In hindsight, he probably should have, he thinks as he opens the front door to find none other than his not-so favourite ex standing on his front porch.

 

Erwin’s taller than Levi remembered him being, more muscle sewn onto his bones, completely lacking in the dark circles that were practically his signature. He looks healthy, Levi thinks bitterly. He’s dressed like a middle-class conservative _dad_ and that almost makes Levi more sick than the fact that Erwin’s smiling down at him with a large, pearly white grin, relief in his eyes and his hands held out like he’s expecting Levi to touch him. Everything about Erwin standing in front of him makes his stomach lurch and his head spin and Levi doesn’t have the time or the _patience_ for any of this, so he slams the door shut.

 

Levi doesn’t realise he’s still standing there minutes later, staring at the front door, hands curled into a fist, until Hanji puts a hand on his shoulder and says his name. “Please tell me he got the fuck off the front porch,” Levi grinds out when he feels like he can speak. Erwin calling is bad enough but actually seeing his face? Levi’s not equipped to handle this, not now. Fuck.

 

“I told you not to answer the door,” Hanji says, but their tone is anything but condescending as they peek through the curtains. “He’s still there.”

 

“What does he want?” Levi demands, a little too loudly, as he runs his hands through his hair. Levi walked away so he wouldn’t have to see Erwin’s face again and now he's showing up where he lives. “Fuck, how did he even find us?”

 

“You think it was Mike?” Hanji answers Levi’s question with their own, as they push their glasses up to the top of their forehead and step in front of Levi to peer through the peephole in the door. “Go away,” they say, loud enough to be heard on the other side.

 

“I just want to talk,” Erwin calls back, voice pleading. Levi’s not fooled by it at all.

 

“He doesn’t want to talk to you,” Hanji responds, face still pressed to the door. Levi pulls them aside and unlocks the door, ignoring their cries of, “What are you doing?!”, as he yanks it open.

 

“Make it quick,” he tells Erwin, refusing to meet his eyes. He doesn’t want any of those old, buried, admittedly unresolved feelings surfacing now. “You have one minute.”

 

“You haven’t been answering my phone calls,” Erwin says a little desperately, taking a step forward. Levi steps back in turn, swinging the door halfway closed. He takes the hint. “I just want closure.”

 

Levi snorts at that and Hanji looks at him in surprise. “You’ve had two years to get your closure. There’s nothing left to close. Your minute is up, goodbye.” Levi goes to shut the door the rest of the way, but Erwin catches it by the frame, no doubt getting splinters in the process.

 

The look he gives Levi is enough to send a chill through him. “Is there someone else?”

 

Hanji’s behind Levi in the next instant, pushing on the door with an open palm. “It doesn’t matter if there is or not,” Levi says, meeting Erwin’s eyes for the first time, thinking of Eren and what he has to shield him from. “You and I are done.”

 

Erwin’s eyes widen as he steps back from the door like he’s been shocked; the door gives way under Hanji’s open palm and slams shut, the sound sending Levi another step backwards. Hanji huffs and looks at Levi with wide eyes. “I thought the bastard was persistent but,” they shake their head. “This isn’t good, Levi.”

 

“No shit,” Levi snaps, feeling guilty immediately. “Fuck.” He sits on the arm of the loveseat next to the entranceway. “Hanji, what the fuck am I supposed to do.”

 

“I would say hope he leaves you alone but after this -- ” they shake their head again and cross their arms. “What if you actually talked it out with him?”

 

“Are you fucking crazy?” Levi asks with no real heat in his tone.

 

“I’m serious,” Hanji says. “I’m not saying sleep with him or anything, I’m saying _talk_ to him. Figure out what he wants.”

Levi blinks at Hanji. “Are you telling me to _compromise_ with him?” With the man that just got out of fucking rehab, _after_ spending time in jail for second-degree _robbery_ \- which he should have gotten more time for but white-collar Smith from a good background, God forbid he tarnish the family name, had his daddy pay off whatever fucking judge or officers. Levi should be grateful, it got him off too, but it’s still fucked as hell. All of it is fucked, this whole situation is fucked.

 

“It’s either that or have him banging down our door again,” Hanji says in that tone they use when they’ve just written out the conclusion of Science Project of the Week.

 

“I’ll think about it,” Levi relents because he knows Hanji won’t get off his back unless he does. “Remind me to delete Mike’s number.”

 

“Way ahead of you,” Hanji sing-songs, leaving Levi to flop back on the couch, stare at the ceiling, and wondering where exactly everything went so wrong.

 

~X~

 

Eren doesn’t know just how long Annie is planning on staying, and her presence around the house makes him itchy, but also acts as a buffer between him and Mikasa. Mikasa talks to Eren like he isn’t stressing out constantly over her drinking, like he doesn’t blame himself, like she didn’t completely 180 him and distract herself with Annie. Eren can’t lie - he thinks maybe he’s distracting himself with Levi in the same way. But at least _Eren_ knows that they’re only going to go so long not addressing whatever it is causing the tension between them before something goes terribly wrong.

 

At the very least, Mikasa hasn’t gotten even the slightest bit tipsy now that Annie is around, and has also laid off him a little about his schedule and the eating, and well, Levi. She doesn’t even question Eren when he stays up far too late on the phone with Levi for the next few days, just reminds him on the Thursday beforehand that he has another appointment tomorrow. Aside from her usual mother hen status, Mikasa has barely said a word to Eren at all, and he can’t decide if he’s grateful for it or even more worried.

 

Eren tries not to think too much about the fight they had, but it still snakes its way into his thoughts and makes him nauseous.

 

Annie, on the other hand, makes small conversation with Eren like they’ve long been acquainted for ages. He always replies in kind, but hasn’t had the opportunity to really interrogate on her who exactly she is, why he’s never met her before, why she’s even staying with them.

 

The opportunity presents itself when Levi invites Eren to his work - “Come by, I’ll give you free food like a good boyfriend and then we’ll go see some stereotypical, regurgitated rom-com at the movie theatre.” (Honestly Eren went staticy the moment Levi said _boyfriend_.)

 

Eren sneaks into the living room to see what Mikasa and Annie are doing, the phone still in his hand. He finds them on the couch, both of them looking utterly bored at whatever it is they’re watching. “Hey, Mikasa,” he tries, and she looks over at him with the same bored expression. “Do you think maybe you could give me a ride to the city?”

 

Mikasa furrows her brow. “What’s in the city?”

 

Eren clears his throat. “Well, Levi -”

 

“He can’t pick you up?” Mikasa questions, looking back towards the TV.

 

“He’s working.”

 

Annie looks back and forth between them for a moment, before standing up from the couch. “Don’t worry, I’ll take you.”

 

Mikasa looks personally offended at the prospect, but says nothing as Annie holds her hand out expectantly. Mikasa passes the keys from her pocket to her and they exchange another loaded look that Eren can’t read. He shifts uneasily on his feet, thinking that he’s never spent time with Annie without Mikasa being there, but maybe he’ll be able to get some answers if he does.

 

Mikasa lets them go with a “Be safe” and another lingering glance at Annie that Eren will have to decipher later before they’re climbing into Mikasa’s truck and tearing off towards the highway. Eren has no idea how to even begin to approach Annie with all of the questions he has, and is just starting to work up the courage to start with something along the lines of how long her and Mikasa have been friends, before Annie speaks up herself. “So, you and _Levi_.” She says his name the same way everyone else does - with trepidation and _knowing_ , like there’s something about him that everyone thinks Eren is missing.

 

“Yeah,” Eren says, the courage he has worked up still bubbling under the surface. “So, you and Mikasa.”

 

Annie side-eyes Eren with a smirk that he can’t read. Eren can’t read Annie at all. “I’m not sleeping with your sister. She’s not into that.”

 

Blushing defeats the entire purpose of the conversation, but Eren does it anyway. “Do you know Levi?” he asks in an attempt to steer the conversation elsewhere.

 

“Not personally,” Annie admits, fingers tapping against the steering wheel. Mikasa’s never let anyone else drive her truck before. Eren thinks that says a lot about their relationship, and just as much about what he’s not seeing. “Everyone knows about him though. Punk guy who gets into fights a lot.”

 

“He’s not really punk,” Eren says, staring out the passenger side window.

 

Annie hums. “Labels are overrated. Anyway, I don’t think anyone expected to see him hanging around with a guy like you.”

 

“What is that supposed to mean?” Eren asks, feeling defensive.

 

“You’re awkward,” Annie shrugs with one shoulder. “He’s not.”

 

Eren wants to deny that he’s _awkward_ but the realisation that it’s true drives that out. “Well, I didn’t expect to have you move in with us, but shit happens.”

 

“Oh wow,” Annie says, looking mildly impressed. “You do cuss.” Eren’s a lot more awkward than he initially thought he was if more than one person is pointing out every time he actually says a curse word.  “I have a dad who doesn’t like the fact that I’d rather kiss girls than boys,” she continues by way of explanation. “So, yeah, shit happens.”

 

Eren doesn’t actually know what to say to that and they drive in silence for several minutes before Annie says, “Hey, do you need condoms by the way?”

 

Eren nearly chokes on the air he’s breathing. “W-what?” The shift in conversation is enough to catch him off guard but then there’s the fact that Annie just offered him _condoms_.

 

“You’re dating _Levi_ ,” Annie rolls her eyes. “I figured condoms would be a good truce gift.”

 

Eren’s earlier courage dissolves entirely. “I’m - we’re not - it’s not like that, yet.” Eren hadn’t even thought about any of that. Well, maybe a little, but he always stops himself because how _mortifying_ would it to be to think of Levi’s hands and mouth when Eren’s in the shower and -

 

“ _Yet_ ,” Annie repeats, putting emphasis on the word. “Just let me know. I have these friends, Reiner and Bertholdt, they have enough for a whole army.”

 

Eren stares open-mouthed for a moment before clamping his jaw shut and looking away again. “Thanks,” he says, trying to sound more snippy than he actually does. The names Annie dropped sound familiar, but at the moment he’s still stuck on trying to equate Levi and condoms that he doesn’t have the concentration to place them. In yet another attempt to derail the thought process, Eren asks Annie, “How long are you planning on staying with us?”

 

Annie hums again. “I don’t know. Want me out?”

 

“It’s not that -”

 

“You don’t trust me,” she interrupts, voice softer than before. The whole concept of _trust_ in general keeps coming around to bite Eren in the ass. “That’s kind of hypocritical, y’know. Mikasa doesn’t trust Levi, and yet -”

 

“I didn’t come home drunk after spending time with Levi,” Eren snaps, the anger he’s being feeling for the past week about that whole situation coming back in full force.

 

“Mikasa’s a grown-up,” Annie lifts an eyebrow. “She can handle herself. She has it under control.” Eren looks over at Annie at that. Does she know more than Eren thinks she does, about Mikasa’s drinking? “It’s not a daily thing, and I’m not going to stop her from wanting to have fun.” Everything about the turn the conversation has taken makes Eren antsy all over again and suddenly he wants more than anything not to be in the car at that moment. Annie was right when she said Eren didn’t trust her, and right now she’s doing little to help that.

 

“Take the I-95,” Eren says flatly. “It’s faster.”

 

Annie drops a still confused, mostly answerless Eren off in front of the Taco Bell several minutes later, where Eren can see Levi leaning by the front entrance, smoking a cigarette. Eren stares after Annie for a moment before turning on his heel to meet up with Levi, who puts out his cigarette the moment Eren’s in ear-shot. “Sorry about this,” he says, flicking what’s left of it into the nearby garbage can. “Sometimes a man just needs a smoke.” He looks Eren up and down for a second. “I’d kiss you but I probably taste really gross right now.”

 

“I don’t care,” Eren says, stepping forward so he can duck his head to kiss Levi. Maybe it’s because he’s still thinking about how Annie called him awkward, or maybe it’s because he’s just more comfortable with Levi in general, but either way he finds that kissing Levi isn’t as clumsy as it was before.

 

“Wow,” Levi says against his lips. “You’re getting brave.”

 

Suddenly, there’s a blur of pink hair and flailing limbs stepping between them and when Eren steps back, blinking in surprise, he sees Isabel narrowing her eyes at him with a hand on her hip. “Stop distracting big brother,” she scolds. “He has work to do.”

 

Levi scoffs behind her and takes the spare visor Isabel’s holding in her hand to situate it on his own head. “Play with him while I handle the drive-thru,” he says, casting Eren a wink before pushing his way through the glass doors of the entrance.

 

Eren watches him go before turning back to Isabel, who’s smiling up at him with a gleam in her eye that he should probably be concerned about. “Um,” he starts, rubbing the back of his neck with a hand. “Shouldn’t you be working, too?”

 

 _“I’m_ on break,” Isabel announces, her smile getting impossibly bigger. She steps towards him to link her arm through this and starts to half-drag him through the front doors. “Come on, brother doesn’t get off for another half hour. We can people-watch.”

 

“Is Levi really your brother?” Eren asks as Isabel continues to pull him inside. Eren honestly hasn’t given it much thought although he’s heard her refer to Levi as _big brother_ a lot; he doesn’t see any family resemblance, but to be fair Eren doesn’t correct people when they call Mikasa his sister. In fact, he himself refers to Mikasa as such.

 

“Hmm?” Isabel hums as she roughly yanks Eren down into one of the booths to sit next to her. “Oh, no I just call him that, because we grew up together and all.” She rests her elbow on the table and her chin in the palm of her hand. “We grew up on the poor side of town, and everyone always looks down at us - Levi, Farlan and I, I mean - but big brother’s always so protective. He got me this job.” She points to her hat proudly with her free hand. “If you want anyone looking out for you, little guy, it’s Levi.”

 

Isabel’s words make Eren feel immensely grateful, and, well, _lucky_ , as he glances over to the cash register where Levi is staring up at a particularly unhappy looking customer. He looks so thoroughly _done_ with the man waving his arms at him that Eren has to bit into his lip to hide a smile. He still hasn’t totally figured out what Levi sees in him, but at this point he’s so enthralled he’s in no position to argue. He certainly doesn’t want to, because Levi has managed what Eren once thought was impossible and that’s make him _happy_.

 

Isabel drags Eren’s attention back again by leaning close and whispering something quite rude about the customer Levi’s still glaring at. In fact, Isabel passes the time by whispering a lot of rude things about the patrons in general and it makes Eren wonder if she’s ever said anything about him. He doesn’t know why, but somehow he doubts it. When the thirty minutes are up and Levi is walking towards them, Isabel says suddenly, “Levi really likes you.”

 

Eren looks at her in surprise, but she continues on, “I mean _really_ likes you. I haven’t seen him like this with anyone since -” she breaks off, and goes really quiet, looking everywhere but at Eren.

 

It makes him nervous, but before he can do anything about it, Levi is approaching them and saying, “Stop talking shit about me.”

 

Isabel sticks her tongue out at Levi and motions for Eren to get out of the booth; he complies and she stands up straight, fixing her hat on her head. “Have fun on your movie date!” she says cheerfully, despite the fact that two seconds ago she was saying cryptic things about Levi, who steps next to Eren to grab his wrist.

 

They manage to dodge Isabel’s coos (thanks to Farlan, who calls to her to get back to work from behind the counter), as Levi leads Eren out into the parking lot. “Got the piece of shit station wagon today,” Levi says bitterly as they walk towards said car. “My bike’s fucked up again. I know that mechanic fuck Jean sabotaged it.” He shakes his head.

 

“Jean?” Eren repeats. He hasn’t seen Jean in a while, and he shouldn’t be surprised upon hearing that Jean’s exactly who fixed up Levi’s motorcycle the first time, but he is. It’s a little weird to consider Mikasa’s sphere of friends interacting with Levi.

 

“Oh yeah, he’s friends with your sister isn’t he,” Levi says, unlocking the car. “Tell her to tell him ‘fuck you’.”

 

“Why would he sabotage it?” Eren wonders out loud, but Levi just casts him a glance and he remembers that Levi punched Jean in the face the day he and Eren met. Levi opens the back door and gestures for Eren to sit down as he reaches into the back of the station wagon to pull out a backpack.

 

“I smell like sweat and tacos,” Levi complains, taking his hat off and putting it on the top of the car. “I’m not wearing this to the movies.” Eren watches him rifle through it to pull out a fresh t-shirt, sucking in a breath when Levi takes his work one off. Right there, in the parking lot. Eren glances around to make sure nobody’s staring, although the point is moot because Eren himself is. He thinks of Annie offering him condoms earlier and looks down in an attempt to hide the blush no doubt colouring his face.

 

Levi makes a face once he has his fresh shirt on. “I hate those fucking uniforms. I don’t look good in purple.”

 

“I think you look cute,” Eren says cheekily and Levi rolls his eyes.

 

“No, _you’re_ cute. I’m hot.”

 

“Aww,” Eren starts, but is cut off when Levi picks his hat up to push it onto Eren’s head, dragging the visor low over his eyes.

 

“Come on, brat,” Levi says, opening the driver’s side door. “Let’s go see a movie.”

 

~X~

 

They settle on the generic rom-com that Levi suggested in the first place, and although it’s relatively mediocre and not at all funny, Eren is entirely appreciative for the time spent with Levi. He reflects on the fact that it’s first time they’ve been truly alone, and tries very hard not to think about that later when they’re back in the station wagon and Levi’s driving him home.

 

“I can’t believe I wasted twenty bucks on that movie,” Levi says with the shake of his head. “At least the actor was hot.”

 

Eren laughs. “He looked really bored when they were - y’know.”

 

“Fucking,” Levi finishes for him, raising an eyebrow. “I’ve seen pornos with more enthusiasm than that guy.”

 

They get home quicker than Eren’s expecting, and he can’t say he’s not a little disappointed, but then Levi turns to him and cups the back of his neck to pull him down into a kiss. “We are literally always getting cockblocked,” Levi says when he pulls away. “And you’re too pretty _not_ to be kissed, so stay here and make out with me for a minute, yeah?”

“In my driveway?” Eren squeeks, casting a panicked glance towards the front door. “What if Mikasa sees?”

 

Levi shrugs, “Let her,” and kisses Eren again, long and hard and the way Levi uses his tongue should be _illegal_ , probably _is_ illegal somewhere, and he’s heard Levi complain about how nicotine gum tastes bad but Eren thinks it tastes something close to wonderful inside Levi’s mouth. Once, in middle school, Eren tried the whole nibble-on-the-bottom-lip thing and ended up making his girlfriend bleed, but Levi manages to pull it off somehow, leaving Eren to make these frankly embarrassing groaning noises - and oh God, now Levi’s hand is on Eren’s _thigh_ and -

 

_Fuck._

 

“Eren,” Levi says, as Eren screw his eyes shut so that he doesn’t have to bear looking Levi in the face. “Are you -”

 

“I’m-I’m really sorry!”

 

He doesn’t think he’s ever been so embarrassed in his entire life, and he’s fully expecting an onslaught of _Eren, it’s perfectly normal to pop a boner while making out with your super hot boyfriend_ but instead, he gets, “You’re effectively proving to me you find me attractive, I don’t know why you’re sorry.” And then a pause, before, “Do you want a handjob?”

 

Eren makes a vague whimpering noise. It’s not that he hasn’t received handjobs before, because he _has_ , albeit messy and awkward and Eren’s not so sure he could last thirty seconds with Levi touching him, which would be more embarrassing than anything. But Levi’s hand is still on his thigh, and he can’t deny that he’s been thinking about this more often than not, so he says, braver than he feels, “If you want.”

 

“I will not touch you until you’re 100% on board,” Levi replies, drumming his fingers against Eren’s leg.

 

“I’m - I’m on board.” More than he’s proud of. _Oh my God._

  
  
“Alright, let’s do this.” Levi is too confidence for Eren to handle, and he feels like the awkward fifteen-year-old virgin he is now more than ever, but Levi’s already _unzipping Eren’s pants_ and he’ll probably come before Levi even gets a good stroke in.

 

“Oh, wow,” Levi says, quirking an eyebrow. “Impressive.”

 

Eren plans on thanking him, maybe, but his head goes instantly fuzzy because now Levi’s touching him, and he’s thought about this in the shower too often, and Levi has hands as talented as his tongue and - _holy shit_. Eren actually gasps out Levi’s name and keeps his eyes shut, as Levi is just so steady and sure in his strokes.

 

“I-” Eren manages to choke out. “I don’t wanna make a - _fuck._ ”

 

“I love it when you say fuck.” Levi sounds entirely too cheeky.

 

“I don’t wanna make a mess in Hanji’s car,” Eren finally gets out, sounding a little

desperate and opening his eyes in an attempt to give Levi some forewarning.  

 

“Oh,” Levi says, stilling his hand, which is the exact opposite of what Eren wants at the moment. “Here,” he reaches into the back seat to swipe up his abandoned Taco Bell uniform shirt.

 

“Isn’t that your work sh _irt?_ ” The last part comes out a little mangled as Levi starts moving his hand again.

 

“I really fucking hate Taco Bell.”

 

Eren doesn’t think the mention of Taco Bell is an appropriate time to be coming all over his boyfriend’s hands, in said boyfriend’s best friend’s car, in front of his own house, but such is his life, and all it takes is one more drawn out, “Fuck,” and a, “There we go,” from Levi. Eren’s gasping and flushed and trying to process what just happened, as Levi wipes his hands casually on his uniform shirt and looks at Eren.

 

“Did you have fun?”

 

“I - yeah.”

  
Needless to say, when Eren finally detaches himself from Levi and walks inside, he can’t look an ever waiting, question-ready Mikasa in the eye.

**Author's Note:**

> My precious honey bunch [Melissa](http://knoxronald.co.vu/) granted me with the best gift that anyone could ever ask for and that is the wonderful [Mosaics: The Definitive Soundtrack](http://8tracks.com/melooshkah/mosaics-the-definitive-soundtrack). It's as in progress as the fic itself is in but it's the most beauitful work of art I have ever listened to please give Melissa lots of love.
> 
> //Update:  
> One day I was bored and in the mood for angry rock music so I made an [Eren playlist](http://8tracks.com/vulcanot/mosaics-eren) for this fic aww  
> ///Update 2:  
> I got bored again and so here's a [Levi playlist](http://8tracks.com/vulcanot/mosaics-levi) with just as much angry rock music.


End file.
